The Burning Man

by Paul Finch

  Tradesmen to the rear

  An entry stood on the left, arched and rather dim, apparently leading to the back. Heck walked down it. Halfway along, there was a door without a handle. A sliding slat was fitted in an aperture at head-height. This too was closed.

  He gave the coded knock, which was three rapid taps, followed by a brief delay and then a fourth. What sounded like a pair of high heels clicked across a tiled floor on the other side. The slat was drawn back, and a woman looked out. She was in her mid-forties and attractive, but heavily made-up, with a short tangle of jet-black hair.

  ‘How can I help you, love?’ she asked pleasantly.

  ‘Hi … erm, Kaplain sent me.’

  ‘And what’s your pleasure?’

  ‘Toad in the hole.’

  She closed the slat, there was a rattle and bang as at least two bolts were drawn back, and the door opened. She stepped aside, admitting him into an everyday suburban kitchen. There was even a pan bubbling on the stove.

  ‘I’m Sookie,’ the woman said, closing and bolting the door behind him and offering a bejewelled hand. She had a curvaceous figure showcased to perfection in a filmy white negligee, and beneath that white lingerie and stockings. ‘Come this way.’

  She walked from the kitchen, prettily and yet businesslike on her red velvet heels, through a short hall and into a tastefully furnished lounge. A real-flame gas fire burned in the grate, warming everything nicely. She turned to face him again. Briefly, the alluring smile slipped.

  ‘It’s fifty for a massage, seventy-five for a toss, a hundred for a blow, two hundred for the full works – straight. I don’t do anals, golden showers, CP, sub-dom or anything like that. But I can give you addresses where they do. For a fee, of course. We don’t practise unsafe sex, you use our rubbers and you pay for them afterwards.’

  ‘Do I get a choice of women?’ Heck asked.

  Sookie regarded him carefully. ‘Will I not do?’

  ‘Hey, no … I fancy you something chronic. But I was led to believe there was more than one of you working here.’

  ‘Were you indeed.’

  Another door in the room creaked open. A man of about thirty entered, casually – too casually – folding a daily paper. He was short but thickset, with sloping, apelike shoulders and a shaved bullet-head. The sleeves of his T-shirt had been torn off, exposing heavily muscled and tattooed arms. With his sunbed tan and diamonds glinting in either ear-lobe, everything about him said ‘pimp’.

  ‘Who told you that?’ the man asked, rolling the newspaper tightly.

  Heck shrugged innocently. ‘Don’t you always have more than one? I mean, what if I wanted two at the same time … so to speak?’

  ‘Could be arranged,’ Sookie said. ‘Not at this short notice though. And not today.’

  ‘Ahh – right.’

  ‘Still with us?’ she asked.

  Heck shrugged again, and nodded.

  ‘Fancy a drink first?’

  ‘Yeah, great. Scotch, if you’ve got it.’

  Sookie moved to a drinks cabinet and tipped two fingers from a bottle of Bells into a cut crystal tumbler. Heck smiled and nodded, but was acutely aware of the man watching from behind.

  ‘It’s just –’ Heck said ‘– well, it’s just that I heard you had a girl called Mindy-May working here? I heard she was pretty good.’

  Sookie managed to splash whisky all across the top of the drinks cabinet.

  ‘Ice?’ she asked in a voice suddenly as brittle as the glass in her hand.

  ‘Nah. I’ll take it as it comes.’

  She turned, smiling again, and exchanged a quick, covert look with her burly guardian, before he withdrew from the room. Heck accepted the drink and nodded his thanks. He sipped at it and grinned, the daft lad again with more money than sense.

  ‘So – is she in today? Mindy?’

  ‘Yes, she is,’ Sookie said.

  ‘And is she available?’

  ‘Why don’t you finish your drink, and I’ll take you up.’

  ‘Great, smashing.’

  He sank the scotch and handed the empty over. It seemed more than suspicious that he hadn’t been asked to pay at least half the fee in advance. That was the usual form. Sookie opened the door and stepped into the hall, beckoning him.

  ‘It isn’t very often we get requested by name,’ she said.

  ‘I just heard she was really good,’ he replied, following.

  ‘You’re obviously a bloke who knows what he wants.’

  There was no sign of the pimp when they arrived at the foot of the staircase. It was dark at the top. The next door along, presumably the front door, was heavily curtained.

  ‘Up there,’ Sookie said, still smiling. ‘First door on the left.’

  Heck started ascending. Below him, Sookie headed off towards the lounge. He watched the dimness above, warily – but then, with a sharp rustle of cloth, the curtain over the front door whipped aside, and the pimp, no longer armed with a newspaper but with an aluminium baseball bat, leaped out. In two strides he’d mounted the stairs behind Heck and swept the bat downward at his head. Heck, who’d been expecting this, ducked and barrelled backward into him.

  They fell together, limbs tangled, to the bottom of the staircase.

  ‘Get in here!’ Heck shouted in a strangled voice. ‘Officer under attack!’

  It wasn’t initially clear whether Hayes and Quinnell had heard this, but his assailant certainly hadn’t. A rough, brawny customer, he was all over Heck as they wrestled on the hall floor. Heck’s first priority was to ensure the bastard couldn’t get into another position from where he could swing the bat, and so clamped himself to the guy like a limpet. The pimp struggled gamely, but though he was physically strong, he didn’t have much technique. Heck finally twisted the bat from his grasp, mashing his head into the pimp’s face twice in rapid succession. As the pimp sagged backward, bloody-mouthed, Heck threw a hard right, slamming it on the side of his jaw, flinging him against the newel post, from which his head rebounded like a football. Sookie now hurtled in from the kitchen, screeching, carving knife in hand.

  Briefly, she looked wild-eyed, capable of anything, but suddenly there was a furious hammering at the front door. Muffled voices clamoured: ‘Police officers! Open up or we’ll break the fucking door down!’

  ‘They’re not kidding,’ Heck said, swaying to his feet. ‘I’d do as they say.’

  Sookie’s jaw sagged. ‘You’re a copper? All this bloody fuss, and you’re a sodding copper!’ She looked furious, but at the same time relieved.

  Heck pulled out his wallet and flipped it open, revealing his warrant card. ‘DS Heckenburg.’

  She dropped her knife to the carpet.

  ‘Police officers!’ There was a massive blow on the other side of the door.

  ‘All right! For Christ’s sake, I’m coming!’ Sookie shouted.

  She studied Heck’s ID in passing as she stepped over the groaning pimp, drew the curtain aside and yanked back bolts. The door crashed open, and Hayes, Quinnell, Finnegan and Klebworth forced their way inside, the three DCs armed with ASPs. Meanwhile, Heck dragged the pimp over onto his front and cuffed his hands behind his back.

  ‘You, my friend,’ he said, ‘are a dickhead of the first order.’

  Hayes grabbed Sookie, twisting her arm behind her back too. ‘This one coming?’

  ‘Let’s speak to them first,’ Heck said. ‘Off the record.’

  He hauled the pimp to his feet and frog-marched him through to the lounge. Hayes did the same with Sookie, who wildly protested her innocence. Behind them, Quinnell grinned ear to ear as he closed the front door.

  In the lounge, the captives were thrown side by side on the couch. The pimp, who’d come round properly now, glowered as the three cops stood assessing them.

  ‘What’s your name?’ Heck asked him.

  ‘Cowley … Scott Cowley.’

  ‘Well, Scott, I suggest you save that mean look for the clink. Bloke like you, all muscle an
d no bite, they’re going to love you in there.’

  ‘You should’ve told us who you were,’ Sookie said, almost crying.

  ‘Why should I?’ Heck replied. ‘I didn’t know who you were. Anyway, cut the crap. Where’s Mindy-May?’

  ‘Upstairs, in the back room. But she won’t come out. She’s petrified.’

  ‘She tell you about the sex-shop attack?’

  Sookie nodded dumbly.

  Heck glanced at Hayes, whose cheeks coloured – this was the first real confirmation they’d had that they were on the right trail.

  ‘What do you think we’re here for?’ the DI asked Sookie. ‘We’d have given her protection.’

  ‘But only on your terms, yeah?’ Cowley sneered. ‘And if she’s willing to go to court … which’ll be near enough a death sentence for her.’

  ‘Go upstairs if you want,’ Sookie said. ‘But that door locks from the inside and she won’t even open it for me –’

  ‘She won’t open it for anyone,’ Cowley cut in.

  ‘And what role do you play in this, Scott?’ Heck asked. ‘Apart from getting the old riding crop out if the girls don’t deliver?’

  ‘I look after them. That’s all.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re worth every penny,’ Finnegan said with a snigger.

  ‘Why’d you come at me with the bat?’ Heck asked.

  ‘Why’d you think?’ Cowley snorted. ‘No punters are supposed to know Mindy-May’s here.’

  ‘Gimme a break, Scott. Do you seriously think anyone on your network of lowlifes can keep their gobs shut?’

  Cowley shook his head. ‘You still might’ve been him … the Incinerator.’

  ‘We were trying to do you a favour, coming here covertly,’ Hayes said. ‘If we hadn’t been concerned to keep things quiet and keep you people safe, we could have got a warrant and kicked the bleeding door down. Drawn the attention of the entire street. Now we’ve almost had to do that anyway, thanks to you.’

  Cowley averted his eyes. ‘I always knew this’d be a fucking disaster.’ He turned and, without warning, head-butted Sookie on the cheek; there was a smack of meat on bone. ‘Stupid fucking bitch!’

  Heck yanked him up to his feet by his T-shirt and tripped him, pitching him down face-first onto the carpet, before dropping on him from behind with his knees, eliciting a combination of shocked gasp and agonised yelp.

  ‘You’re a less impressive guy by the minute, Scott,’ Heck said. ‘Now, as things are, I’ll shortly be arresting you for attempting to cause grievous bodily harm. I’m pretty sure we’ve got enough to do you for managing a brothel as well. Do we add battery too? It’s all piling up, pal.’

  ‘Do your fucking worst,’ Cowley muttered. ‘We were dead as soon as that stupid tart’s mate turned up here.’

  ‘If you don’t fancy a trip to Bradburn nick via Bradburn A&E, I suggest you stay here on the floor and don’t sodding move.’ Heck stood up again, turning to Sookie and leaning down to check the side of her face, which was blotched a nasty shade of red. ‘You all right?’

  ‘It’s nothing I haven’t had before,’ she said, probing it, grimacing with the pain.

  ‘You’d better take us upstairs. The sooner we get this over, the better.’

  She nodded, and climbed tiredly to her feet.

  Hayes turned to Quinnell, Klebworth and Finnegan. ‘Have a look around … make sure there’s no one else here. And one of you keep a close eye on this sunbed wank-stain.’ She kicked at Cowley’s foot. ‘I’d hate him to give us a reason to really beat his brains in.’

  Chapter 29

  ‘Go back a bit, you and Mindy-May?’ Heck asked Sookie, as she led him and Hayes up the stairway.

  ‘I was on the game when she was a toddler,’ Sookie said over her shoulder. ‘We’ve known each other a while though. Did a mum-and-daughter thing for the Inside-Out website.’

  ‘Nice,’ Hayes commented.

  They arrived at the top and took a passage to the rear of the property, where a locked door stood to the left. Sookie tapped on it gently, as if it was a sickroom. ‘Can I come in, love? It’s me.’

  ‘What was all that racket?’ came a muffled enquiry from the other side.

  ‘Scott chucking someone out.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Just some drunk.’

  There was a brief pause. ‘You sure?’

  ‘Would I lie to you, pet?’

  There was another pause, longer than before. And then a key turned in a lock and bolts were withdrawn. Heck went hard at the door, Hayes close behind. It swung open, the girl on the other side staggering backward, wailing with fright. She was pale-faced and spotty, with red eyes, mascara-stained cheeks and long, fair hair, though at present it was straggly and sweaty. Her baggy shorts and vest did little to accentuate a bony, semi-emaciated figure; both her arms were striated with needle tracks. To be fair to her, the stink probably owed as much to the room as its occupant. It was small and dingy, and littered with crumpled clothing and bedsheets; all its windows were closed, and a portable electric fire blazed in the corner.

  The girl’s eyes flitted from one intruder to the next, but finally locked on Sookie.

  ‘You bitch … what have you done?’

  ‘It’s for the best, love,’ Sookie said in a voice that begged for understanding.

  ‘Oh, Jesus …’ Mindy-May reached behind her as she backed off, producing a switchblade, which she snapped open to a length of five inches.

  ‘For God’s sake, girl, we’re police officers,’ Hayes said. ‘Put the knife down.’

  ‘Does everyone in this house carry weapons?’ Heck asked Sookie.

  ‘At times like this, what do you think?’

  ‘Just drop the blade, OK?’ Hayes said again. ‘We don’t want to have to arrest you too.’

  ‘No chance!’ Mindy-May backed to the far side of the room. ‘I’m not going with you scum!’

  ‘Come on, Sonja,’ Heck coaxed her in a softer tone. ‘I can call you Sonja, can I?’

  She looked bewildered that he knew this was her real name.

  ‘Come on,’ he urged her. ‘Just put the knife down, eh?’

  ‘I don’t know you … I don’t know any of you.’

  ‘We’ve already identified ourselves,’ Hayes said. ‘We’re police officers. You’re safe.’

  ‘Yeah, right! You got your fireproof overalls with you? Because I haven’t. How about a shield to protect you against a flamethrower? I must have left mine at home too.’

  ‘I understand why you’re frightened,’ Heck said. ‘Believe me, I do. But there’s no need. You come with us, and this maniac won’t get anywhere near you.’

  ‘You can’t stay here, love,’ Sookie added. ‘You wouldn’t be safe here, would you?’

  ‘Yeah, well, you’ve proved that, haven’t you – you cow!’

  ‘Mindy … come on,’ Sookie pleaded, looking genuinely hurt.

  ‘You can’t blame Sookie,’ Heck said. ‘She did her best for you. She’s got that meathead downstairs, but he’s no bloody good. And she has to let people in … she has to make a living, doesn’t she?’

  ‘You can’t stay here for ever, love,’ Sookie advised her. ‘I told you to go to the coppers. Said you’ll have to eventually. Scott said it too.’

  ‘Put the blade down at least,’ Hayes urged her. ‘You can clearly see you don’t need it.’

  Slowly, warily, Mindy-May lowered the knife. In a belated nervous reaction, her fingers uncurled and it dropped to the rug.

  ‘Kick it into the corner, eh?’ Heck said. ‘Where it can’t do any harm.’

  Mindy-May didn’t kick it. She only had socks on her feet, and the switchblade was still open. Instead, she bent down, picked it up again and tossed it onto the rumpled bed.

  ‘That’s better.’ Heck relaxed his posture, trying to put her at ease. ‘At least we don’t now think we’re gonna get gutted alive for asking the wrong question, eh?’

  ‘You say that as if this is some kind of jo
ke,’ Mindy-May said. Her voice turned shrill again. ‘I bet you don’t know what it’s like to live in fear, do you, for fuck’s sake!’

  ‘I wouldn’t say that,’ he replied. ‘Every time I pursue a killer I live in fear. That he’s going to kill again before I nail him, and maybe again after that, and maybe again. You’re correct, Sonja, this isn’t a joke. Right now, everyone in this room has a very serious job to do. You included.’

  She shook her head quickly. Too quickly, Heck realised. Way too quickly.

  ‘I can’t help you!’ she asserted. ‘All right? You need to understand that. I can’t!’

  ‘I haven’t even asked you a question yet,’ he replied.

  Her face reddened. ‘It doesn’t matter what you ask me …’

  ‘Oh, I think it does, Sonja. You know why? Because I think deep down you’re a decent person. I think you saw something terrible happen and you want to make it right, but you don’t quite know how.’ He gave her his most earnest stare. ‘Is that correct?’

  ‘But I don’t know anything …’

  ‘You know what you saw, Sonja. That’s all we want to talk to you about. Nothing else.’

  ‘I … erm …’ she stuttered helplessly.

  ‘Let’s start with an easy one,’ he said. ‘What happened at Sadie’s Dungeon?’

  ‘You don’t already know?’

  ‘Like I said, I want to know what you saw.’

  ‘It was …’ She struggled to find the words, her hollow cheeks tinging even brighter red. ‘It was knocking-off time. I was getting changed, and then I heard this … shouting, and these screams.’ Fresh tears bubbled from her eyes; she clamped a hand to her mouth. ‘Jesus, those screams … you’ve never heard anything like it. It was Les and Barrie. I … couldn’t help myself. I ran out of the dressing room … and soon as I got into the corridor, I felt the heat … and saw the fire at the far end. I had to go down there. That was the only way out. I was in a kind of daze, I suppose. Anyway … that’s it.’ She shook her head wildly, eyes turned glassy. ‘That’s all I saw. Fire … everywhere. And those two poor lads blazing … I mean really blazing, like logs on a bonfire. I just legged it out the back way. Obviously I legged it. I wasn’t going to hang around inside a burning building, was I? For fuck’s sake, why the fuck would anyone do that?’