Stalkers

by Paul Finch

  Very abruptly, the vehicle slid to a halt.

  There was a squeal of tyres, and a loud clunk as the handbrake was applied.

  Louise lay shuddering as the engine was switched off and two car doors opened and closed simultaneously. This had already happened several times during the course of her imprisonment in here. There was the incident when she was given water, but on the other occasions no one had come to her. Hours had then passed, during which she’d squirmed and wrestled with her bonds, and again had tried to cry out — to no avail. Whoever had taken her was clearly moving her from place to place and, on the few occasions when they’d left her, they chose somewhere very private where not a sound could be heard. In due course, they’d always returned and the car had started up again.

  However, that didn’t happen this time.

  Icy fingers scurried all over Louise as she listened to the sound of heavy feet approaching. A key was fitted into the lock, there was another clunk, and light spilled down on her; it was so bright after her long hours of confinement that it poured through her blindfold, searing her retinas. When the cloth strap was torn away, she snapped her eyelids shut and averted her face, but rough hands took hold of her. She moaned and went dizzy as they hauled her upright and left her in a sitting position. Blinking rapidly, she tried to adjust her vision, but only after several seconds did everything swim into focus. What she saw proved just how long she’d been peering into empty blackness: it wasn’t glaring sunshine that had half-blinded her, but the gloomy twilight of an underground car park.

  Her eyes darted fearfully around, seeing water-marks on concrete pillars, loops of corroded chain hanging from overhead. About twenty yards in front was the hulk of a burned-out vehicle. Beyond that lay deep shadows, cross-cut with occasional shafts of dull, grimy daylight. Then she saw the two men looking down at her.

  Both wore dark overalls and gloves, and knitted ski-masks with holes cut for their eyes and mouths. One ski-mask was purple, the other day-glo orange. She stared helplessly back, eyes bulging, as they appraised her.

  ‘She’s a fucking sight,’ the one in the purple mask said.

  But it was the reply from the one in the orange mask which sent a deeper, more paralysing chill through Louise than she’d ever known. ‘Aren’t they always.’

  ‘I suppose she’ll scrub up,’ Purple added.

  Orange continued to stare at her. He was taller than his comrade. Narrow circles of skin were visible around his eye-sockets, and, by the looks of these, he was black. When he’d spoken it had been without an obvious accent, though the other one, who looked to be white, sounded as though he was from the Midlands somewhere.

  ‘Nice legs on her,’ Purple remarked.

  Belatedly, Louise realised that her skirt and shoes had been removed, though her tights, torn full of holes, were still in place.

  Purple leaned down and squeezed her left breast. ‘Firm tits too. Keeps herself in shape for her old fella.’

  Louise barely noticed the personal violation. With each passing second, this ordeal was becoming ever more real. Suddenly it seemed terribly, terribly certain that she’d never see Alan again, or their lovely house in rural Buckinghamshire.

  Purple chuckled. ‘Least she’s not shit herself. Hate it when they do that.’

  ‘P-please,’ she stammered. ‘Let me go, let me go, just let me go … I won’t say anything … how can I say anything, I don’t know anything!’ But it was a spittle-slurred mumble that was barely audible outside the duct-tape. The men paid no attention anyway.

  ‘How we doing for time?’ Orange asked.

  Purple glanced at his watch. ‘No problem.’

  Orange nodded, bent down to a haversack and fumbled around inside it. Louise watched, hair stiffening, not knowing how she’d react if he took out a knife. She was bewildered rather than relieved when he produced a bottle of water and what looked like a ham roll wrapped in cellophane.

  Before doing anything else, Orange regarded her intently with his liquid brown eyes. At last he spoke again, and this time it was to her, not to his henchman.

  ‘Listen love, and listen good. I’m going to take that gag off. You can scream and shout all you want. No one’ll hear. But it’ll piss us off royally, and what’s going to happen to you is still going to happen. The only difference is if we’re pissed off we might decide to beat the fucking shit out of you first. You understand?’

  Louise returned his gaze helplessly, before vaguely nodding. She was in no doubt that he was absolutely serious.

  ‘Now you be a good girl and keep things nice and quiet,’ he added, reaching out and slowly peeling back the duct-tape.

  It snagged on her dry lips and when he tore it loose from the back of her head, yanked out several strands of hair, but at that moment she didn’t mind, she was too thankful to have it taken off her. It was so good to be able to breathe properly.

  She sucked the air in great lungfuls, but despite the promise she’d just made, couldn’t stop herself speaking. ‘Look … whatever it is you want, my husband’ll get it for you. Or my company. I don’t know who you are or why you’re doing this — I don’t even want to know, but look …’

  Orange glared at her. ‘I thought I told you to keep your mouth shut?’

  ‘Just let my husband know I’m alright,’ she begged. ‘That’s all I ask …’

  ‘Alright?’ Purple said casually. ‘Who said you’re alright?’

  She glanced from one to the other, trying to be bold, trying to look as if she wasn’t frightened, but knowing that she was little more than a scared rabbit in their unblinking gaze. ‘You just … you just should know that whatever you took me for, whatever you’ve got planned … you can make money out of this. Good money. All you need to-’

  Orange leaned menacingly towards her. ‘I said shut — the — fuck — up.’

  The edge to his voice was so hard, the maniac gleam in his eye so intense that this time, desperate as she was, Louise clammed up.

  He watched her closely for several seconds, and then, satisfied, unscrewed the cap from the water bottle and offered it to her. At first, Louise felt inclined to refuse — as if such an act of miniature defiance would be a victory over them — but it just as quickly occurred to her that it was ludicrous to think it would ever matter to men like these how dry her throat became. She had to remain clear-minded and level-headed; any action she took must be geared towards survival — that was the only way she was going to get through this. So when she finally drank, she drank deeply, thirstily.

  After that, they presented her with the sandwich, holding it to her mouth, though despite her hunger pangs she was still so sick with fear that she could do no more than nibble at it. As she did, she eyed her surroundings again, wondering if there was any possible means of escape. Far to her right, what looked like an exit/entry ramp sloped down from above, but now that her vision was fully attuned, there were other shattered cars on view: mangled masses of burned or rusty metal, dumped in forgotten corners and thick with dust and cobwebs. It had entered her head that, wherever she was, someone might unknowingly venture down here and prove her accidental saviour, but the more dankness and dereliction she spied, the less likely this seemed. In addition, there was nowhere for her to run to, even in the unlikely event she got free. God knew how many exit ramps she’d have to scramble up before she reached the surface, and she was so weak from her confinement that she doubted she could even stand. Once again, that sense of horror and despair overwhelmed her.

  Giving up on the sandwich, Orange scrunched it in its wrapper and tossed it. He screwed the top back onto the bottle and shoved it into his pocket. ‘Now for dessert,’ he said, delving into the haversack again and taking out a small steel box.

  He opened it to reveal two slim objects, one of which he handed to his compatriot, the other which he kept hold of himself. Louise felt her heart miss a beat when she saw that the objects were hypodermic syringes. The fluid in the one in Purple’s hand was transparent, whilst the
one in Orange’s hand was a dark, brackish red.

  ‘We’re going to inject you,’ Orange said matter-of-factly. He showed her his syringe. ‘As you can see, this one’s dirty. It’s been used loads of times, and currently contains blood that was recently extracted from a heroin-addicted prostitute. However, the one my mate here’s got is sterile and contains a medically-approved sedative. It’s up to you which one we use?’

  There was a brief silence, during which Louise tried to speak but could only gag. Once she’d dry-heaved a couple of times, she glanced up again, but said nothing. She inclined her head slightly to indicate that she’d give them no trouble.

  ‘Smart move,’ Orange said, replacing his blood-filled syringe in the box and putting it away, then clamping a hand across her mouth and pushing her back down into the boot. ‘I knew you’d be sensible.’

  Behind him, Purple removed the cap from the sterile needle and flicked steadily at it with his gloved finger.

  ‘Just lie still,’ Orange added, ‘and think of England.’

  Chapter 4

  Deptford Green Police Station was built in the 1970s, and, typically of that soulless era, was a monolithic structure of grey, faceless cement. It was three floors high and sat with its back to the Thames on a toe of land jutting out into the part of the river that looped south around the Isle of Dogs. From the front it had a relaxed air: there was a blue lamp over its tall, wide entrance and blinds in its windows.

  However, the appearance of life at Deptford Green and its reality were two different things. At the rear of the station, its three impounds, which were crammed to bursting with vehicles recovered after theft or use in crime, and the official personnel car park, were surrounded by nine-foot-high steel fences that were covered in anti-climb paint and had security lights located at regular intervals along their parapets. Also around the rear of the station, offensive, anti-police graffiti was much in evidence (the local commander only insisted on its prompt removal when it appeared at the front), alongside a litter of bricks and broken bottles, which had all been used as missiles on various occasions. There were even bullet-holes in some parts of the station’s exterior, though these too tended to be repaired quickly.

  Deptford, once a thriving dockland, had gone through various incarnations in its past. In the present post-industrial era it had become an urban waste, and even though at the same time it had developed a lively arts and cultural scene, crime and poverty were rampant behind its colourful facade. As a result, though things had improved a little since the dawn of the twenty-first century, there was still an aura of ‘Fort Apache’ about Deptford Green nick, and this was reflected inside as well as out. Even by normal London standards, it was an extraordinarily busy police station. Both uniform and plain clothes officers tended to scramble about its cramped rabbit-warren of passages and rooms as though in a ‘life or death’ hurry. There was a constant trilling of telephones and barking of orders. The custody suite was never less than full of prisoners waiting to be processed.

  Of course, Sunday morning could be an exception. Even the bleakest corners of the inner city tended to be quiet in the soporific hours following the weekly Saturday night booze-fest.

  For this reason, when Heck drove in just after ten that morning, he was surprised to see several more cars parked up than usual, and one in particular — a white BMW Coupe. He stood looking at it for a moment, before going wearily in through the personnel door. The first person he met on entering was Paula Clark, his civilian admin assistant. She was a short, buxom lady, a local lass — bleached-blonde and busty, very much in the Barbara Windsor mould — who’d been loaned to him from local CID Admin.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he said, surprised to see her at the weekend.

  Paula appeared to be on her way out. She was carrying her coat and a handbag under one arm, and a bundle of reports, which she presumably intended to type up at home, under the other. She didn’t smile when she saw him — not that she smiled very much — though on this particular occasion she looked even more irate than usual.

  ‘I had to come in and sort some papers out because you weren’t answering your phone,’ she said.

  He filched his mobile from his jacket pocket and saw that it was dead. ‘Bastard thing’s on the blink again.’

  ‘Superintendent Piper’s here,’ she added.

  ‘I know. I’ve just seen her car outside. What does she want?’

  ‘You.’ Paula gave him a long, meaningful look, then bustled past on her spike-heels and exited the building.

  Heck ascended to the second floor via the back stairs. The office he currently worked from was located in what he was sure was the most under-used and least accessible corner of the building. Local officers here still referred to it as ‘the spare parade room’ even though Heck had now occupied it for over two years.

  He headed down the corridor towards it, only stopping when he saw that the door was already open and the tall shape of Detective Inspector Des Palliser standing there. Palliser was fifty-five now and a hard-bitten cop of many years’ experience, though his lean, grizzled appearance — he was leathery skinned and had sported a scraggy grey beard and moustache for as long as Heck could remember — belied a genial personality. He spotted Heck immediately and beckoned. Heck slouched on towards him, in no hurry. There was someone else in the office, pacing around behind Palliser. By the statuesque shape, pearl blouse, tight black skirt and mass of tawny hair (she wasn’t known as ‘the Lioness’ for nothing), he knew it was Detective Superintendent Gemma Piper. Not atypically, she had a pile of documents in her hand and was discarding them irritably, one after another, as she read speedily through them.

  ‘Morning at last,’ Palliser said, when Heck reached him.

  Heck didn’t say anything. He’d just spotted a notice that someone had hung on the outside of the office door, which read:

  WDFA Squad

  (We Do Fuck All)

  He could have done without that at a time like this, he thought.

  Detective Superintendent Piper was now regarding him from the other side of the room. Locks of hair, which she tended to wear up during the day, had come loose and hung to either shoulder, making her look rather fetching. But she was pale in the cheek and her steel-blue eyes blazed.

  ‘Do you know we’ve been waiting nearly two hours?’ she said.

  ‘Er … no, I didn’t.’

  ‘What do you think you’re playing at, Heck?’ she demanded. Heck was six foot, but Superintendent Piper wasn’t a great deal shorter than him; even if she had been, her force of personality was colossal. She stalked the room in anger. ‘You think I want to spend my Sunday mornings sifting through your chaotic trash?’

  ‘My phone’s not working.’

  ‘Well get one that does!’

  ‘I will … if I can include it on my expenses.’

  She arched an eyebrow. ‘You what?’

  ‘I’ve worn it out on this job, so if I have to buy another one …’

  ‘Are you deliberately winding me up?’

  ‘No, it’s just that …’

  ‘Because I’m not in the mood.’

  ‘I can see that.’

  She jabbed a finger at him. ‘And don’t smart-mouth me either.’

  ‘An apology might be in order, Heck,’ Palliser said. ‘You have kept us waiting.’

  ‘I know, sorry. But I wasn’t expecting you.’

  ‘That’s plainly obvious,’ Superintendent Piper replied, gesturing at the piles of disorderly documentation stacked between the computer terminals, at the unwashed coffee mugs, at the overflowing in-trays. ‘Look at this place; it’s like a bomb site. And while we’re on the subject …’ She crossed the room and snatched the notice from the outside of the door. ‘What’s this supposed to be?’

  Heck gave a wry smile. ‘Wouldn’t be a normal day without one of these appearing.’

  ‘You been rubbing people up the wrong way?’

  ‘I don’t get close enough to rub anyon
e up any way,’ he said. ‘Not anymore. I’m pretty sure it was one of this nick’s detectives who tipped off Bobby Ballamara that his daughter’s disappearance is being treated as part of a series. Don’t see how else he could have found out. He’s made my life hell ever since.’

  ‘Have you got proof of that?’ Palliser asked, looking shocked.

  ‘Course I haven’t.’

  ‘And in the meantime, what does this mean?’ Superintendent Piper asked, still brandishing the notice.

  Heck shrugged. ‘You know what Division are like — they don’t think anyone works as hard as they do. According to them, I’m on a very cushy number here.’

  ‘Unfortunately, they’re not the only ones who think that.’ There was a brief silence. Superintendent Piper suddenly looked awkward, uncomfortable.

  ‘Oh,’ Heck replied. ‘So that’s how it is?’