Mimic

by Daniel Cole

  ‘It’s the neighbour,’ she told them. ‘He must have been wearing a disguise of some sort. But Coates was her neighbour all along!’

  Winter turned to Chambers with the expression of one who had slit her throat himself – recalling the hours-old memory of passing the long-haired man on the stairs.

  ‘He’s got her,’ continued Marshall, ‘and he’s been right under our noses the entire time.’

  Chambers held down the transmit button – broadcasting only background noise, at a loss as to what to say:

  ‘… Copy that.’

  Skidding into the parking area adjacent to the windmill, Winter leapt out before the car had even fully stopped moving, the headlights illuminating his path as he sprinted into the trees.

  ‘Winter! Winter, wait!’ shouted Chambers as he climbed out after him, his words hushed by the wind, dirt and debris pelting him from all angles, the sky literally raining leaves. ‘Winter?!’ he called again, following him into the woods but jarring his leg painfully only a few steps in on the uneven ground.

  The sound was like nothing he had ever heard before: the rustle of a billion leaves like a rattlesnake coiling to strike, the creaking of branches overhead interspersed with sharp cracks as mighty centenarians lost another limb, and the roar of the wind ripping through the trees like great waves crashing on the rocks.

  ‘Eloise?!’ he heard Winter shout just a little way ahead. ‘Eloise, where are you?!’ In agony, Chambers staggered towards the sound. ‘Eloise?! …Eloise?!’

  But then, though sure he was catching up, the calls fell silent.

  ‘Winter?!’ he yelled, receiving no reply.

  Ignoring the pain, he ran blindly through the drowned woodland with a building sense of foreboding on recognising the trees that now surrounded him: alive amid a forest of death.

  Emerging from the treeline, he stumbled into a small clearing, complete with swollen stream fit for a river god, where Winter had collapsed to his knees in the dirt.

  ‘Winter?’ asked Chambers.

  He didn’t react.

  ‘… Winter?’

  Approaching slowly, Chambers looked to the area of disturbed leaves beyond his friend, now understanding the reason for his silence.

  ‘Oh, God,’ he whispered, limping over to the two bodies locked in position against the storm by an intricate metal frame: Robert Coates still in pursuit of his beloved, even in death, his left hand wrapped forever around Eloise’s naked body as she turned away from him one final time.

  Chambers gently pressed his fingers to her throat … the temperature of her skin telling him all he needed to know. He glanced back at Winter, wishing he had some words of reassurance for him, but nothing came.

  Turning to regard Coates’s lifeless form, he performed the same check, placing the tips of two fingers against his neck …

  Startled, Chambers pulled his hand away and was overcome with a pronounced sense of déjà vu, of scaling an icy ladder up to the frozen Thinker all those years earlier, the static man’s gaze now on him, unnervingly watching his every move, the shallow rise and fall of his chest gradually building pace.

  ‘Winter!’ Chambers called without breaking eye contact with the living statue. ‘I need you here. Now!’

  With trepidation, Winter got to his feet. Consciously avoiding looking in Eloise’s direction, he made his way over as Chambers produced a small metal tin from his inside pocket, opening it up to reveal the thin vial, syringe and selection of needles contained inside.

  ‘What is that?’ Winter asked him, his voice breaking.

  ‘The antidote. I had Sykes make it up.’ Eyes instantly wide, he looked over at Eloise. ‘Not for her,’ Chambers told him sadly. ‘… For him.’ As Winter slowly turned to face Coates, Chambers didn’t even recognise his friend any more – all the rage, all the pain, all the power he suddenly held over the other man’s life somehow transforming his features. ‘He’s still alive,’ he explained, handing over the tin and stepping away. ‘It’s your call.’

  ‘My call?’ Winter asked in confusion, staring down at the metal box in his hands as the two statues rocked gently in the relentless wind.

  Chambers nodded: ‘Your call. But remember – this is what he wants. If he dies, he wins.’

  Winter considered their predicament but only for a moment:

  ‘Honestly, I don’t even care any more. I just want him gone,’ he said, a broken man, reaching in and removing the glass vial before dropping it to the ground.

  When Chambers made no effort to intervene, he raised his foot to stamp Coates out of their lives once and for all … but then hesitated, the conflict clear on his face as he looked from the faux-god, powerless to stop him – to Eloise, so elegant and still – and then back to his partner. Foot trembling with indecision, he took a steadying breath and gritted his teeth, fixing his eyes on the fragile vial beneath him …

  With tears streaking down his face, he screamed into the wind and stepped away.

  ‘… Do it,’ he said, closing his eyes as though he couldn’t bear to watch.

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Just do it.’

  Aware that it might already be too late, Chambers hurried over, the incapacitated man’s fearful eyes following him as he knelt down to retrieve the vial, the rigid fingers twitching ever so slightly on being prised free from Eloise and laid down onto the ground. Assembling the injection, Chambers looked back at Winter, giving him one last chance to protest, but he remained silent. Sinking the needle deep into Coates’s neck, he hovered his thumb over the plunger:

  ‘Robert … Robert, can you hear me?’ he whispered into the dying man’s ear. Slowly, the dark eyes found him. ‘Only the living can suffer as you will,’ Chambers recited in satisfaction, depressing his thumb and emptying the entire contents of the syringe into his bloodstream.

  Handcuffing Coates to his own metal frame, he got back up to re-join his colleague as the trees bowed impossibly overhead, eclipsing the sky.

  They stood in silence for a few moments.

  ‘I’m going to go call an ambulance,’ Winter told him, turning his back on the scene, the sight of Coates reluctantly coming back to life beside Eloise’s dramatic corpse too much for him.

  Unsure what to say, Chambers gave him a pat on the back and watched him walk away. Within just five steps, he had disappeared entirely into the moving trees.

  Now alone, Chambers tentatively approached the woman that he felt he had so utterly failed – Eloise: delicate, beautiful, and frozen in flight, as he took a moment to regard Coates’s final tragic masterpiece.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he whispered, now on the verge of tears himself.

  Dazed, he wanted to cover her up, although he knew that he couldn’t. The thin robe, placed with precision to look as though it had slipped naturally off her body, turned inch by inch into the mound of soil and twigs that now consumed her legs. And her hands, lovingly removed, replaced with two thriving branches of deep-green laurel leaves – the culmination of Robert Coates’s life’s work closing with the beginning of her metamorphosis.

  Seven months later …

  Thursday 3 July

  1997

  CHAPTER 34

  Winter gazed up at the supermarket’s bright-orange signage, supposing it had always just been a matter of time before he would have to step back through its doors. Cursing when he realised he was already late, he ceased his inane musings and hurried inside.

  ‘… We have since discovered that Partridge was in the bar at the same time as this man,’ said Marshall, holding the surveillance camera image up for the entire Homicide department to see, the nerve-wracking experience her first time presenting at their weekly progress meeting. ‘No name as of yet, but a known associate of none other than Charlie Slattery,’ she announced, catching Chambers’ eye as the room erupted into excitable murmurs at her revelation.

  She had asked him to sit at the front for moral support, not that it seemed she needed it – as the department�
�s second-newest hire, she had just blown the case wide open.

  ‘So, Detective,’ started Wainwright from her spot perched against the windowsill. ‘How do you intend to proceed?’

  At that moment, the door swung open into Lewis as a flustered and dishevelled Winter came bundling into the room with two large boxes. There were jeers from his colleagues, who pelted him with screwed-up paper balls as he made his way to the front of the room.

  ‘Hey! … Hey!’ he complained, setting the boxes down.

  ‘You’re late, new guy!’ someone heckled him.

  ‘Because I was picking up you lots’ bloody doughnuts!’ he complained.

  ‘Please just sit down,’ Wainwright told him before addressing the rest of the boisterous room: ‘OK. Settle down. Settle down!’

  A few straggling projectiles bounced off Winter’s head as he took a seat beside Chambers, who appeared mildly amused by the whole thing.

  ‘Hey.’

  ‘Hey,’ replied Chambers.

  ‘… Why is there a page ripped out of your notebook?’

  Shaking her head, Wainwright turned back to Marshall:

  ‘My apologies, Detective. How would you like to proceed?’

  ‘I need to find the man in the photo. He’s our only link between them, but that’s going to take a lot of time and legwork. I don’t think I can do it on my own.’

  ‘Nor would I expect you to,’ said Wainwright simply. ‘So … who do you need?’

  The question caught Marshall off guard. But then, from her position at the front of the homicide meeting room, having just apparently been handed her very own investigation to lead, she glanced over at Chambers and Winter bickering in the corner and smiled …

  CHAPTER 35

  Assuming her usual position between the fire alarm and that black scuff on the wall she couldn’t get out no matter what she tried, Denise Smith waited as the prison officers escorted their inmate along the corridor for his thirty minutes of recreation time.

  With bulbous white bandages wrapped around his forearms, another mess she had been asked to clean up, the prisoner shuffled by, Denise keeping her eyes glued to the floor as he passed, always feeling a little guilty about her daily visits.

  ‘All yours!’ one of the officers called back to her.

  Pushing herself off the wall, Denise dutifully grabbed the handle of the mop and wheeled her bucket into the vacated cell.

  She closed her eyes, took a deep breath in anticipation, and then opened them again.

  As one of the only people to ever see inside, she felt it her responsibility to take a few moments to fully appreciate her surroundings, where every last inch of the insipid walls, ceiling and floor was now adorned in breathtaking artwork: delicate pencil sketches, moody smudges carving perfect shadows, pastel portraits alive with colour – every one unique, every one a work of unrivalled brilliance and, as always, every one depicting the exact same subject, the face of the same beautiful woman, time and time again.

  But then she noticed something, something that didn’t belong surrounded by so much love and lament: a lone figure formed out of charcoal and scratches, the anger in the careless scribbles and blurred lines radiating off it, as if it had been clawed out of the wall. Moving a little closer, she peered at the cheerless image, recognising the prisoner’s own likeness captured in the face of the triumphant warrior, the severed head of his snake-haired adversary held high – dark-skinned and vacant-eyed – a trophy for all the gods to see.

  Not liking it one bit, she pulled a face and stepped back to appraise the rest of her own personal art gallery.

  ‘Incredible,’ she muttered, shaking her head in awe. As she had come to expect, the detail in the beautiful woman’s varying expressions was so lifelike that Denise almost felt as though she knew her. ‘Just incredible,’ she said again, wringing the mop out over the soapy water before raising it to her favourite of today’s offerings and starting to scrub.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Firstly, I’d like to thank my new project editor Georgia Goodall for reminding me to actually include these this time, seeing as for Endgame someone somehow forgot to remind me not to forget to remind them that I most likely would (and subsequently did) completely forget – an unintentional F-you to all the wonderful people who made that book possible.

  So, in no particular order:

  A massive thank you to my editor Sam Eades. As someone who could be said to be editorial-adverse, I can honestly say it’s been a blast working on this book together and I look forward to many, many more. Also on the publishing side of things: Ellen Turner, Yadira Da Trindade, Rachel Neely, Jade Craddock, Anna Valentine, Katie Espiner and the rest of the Hachette team.

  As always, thanks to my amazing agent Susan Armstrong for her advice and guidance and to all the team at C&W: Dorcas Rogers, Tracy England, Jake Smith-Bosanquet, Alexander Cochran, Kate Burton and Matilda Ayris to name a few.

  … To my ¾ feral cat, Chonky, for permitting me to live long enough to finish the thing, and to all the rest of my family: L2theB, Sarah, Ma & Ossie, Melo & Indiana B, Bob & KP.

  Not forgetting my very good friends Rob Parsons and Matt Muschol for their endless support and for probably being even more excited about this whole ‘being a writer’ thing than I am.

  A sincere thank you to my readers for their loyalty and tireless enthusiasm, and to all the book bloggers out there who are getting behind this book and helping make sure it gets noticed amid a world of noise.

  … And finally, a very, very special thank you to Alexandra Limon for lending her talents to the beautiful illustrations that made this novel come alive.

  ‘Til next time …

  Go back to where it all began …

  Read on for an extract from

  Ragdoll

  CHAPTER 1

  Saturday 28 June 2014

  3.50 a.m.

  Wolf groped blindly for his mobile phone, which was edging further across the laminate floor with every vibration. Slowly the darkness began to disassemble itself into the unfamiliar shapes of his new apartment. The sweat-sodden sheet clung to his skin as he crawled off the mattress and over to the buzzing annoyance.

  ‘Wolf,’ he answered, relieved that he had at least got that right as he searched the wall for a light switch.

  ‘It’s Simmons.’

  Wolf flicked a switch and sighed heavily when the weak yellow light reminded him where he was; he was tempted to turn it off again. The tiny bedroom consisted of four walls, a worn double mattress on the floor and a solitary light bulb. The claustrophobic box was sweltering thanks to his landlord, who still had not chased the previous tenant up for a window key. Normally this would not have been such an issue in London; however, Wolf had managed to coincide his move with one of England’s uncharacteristic heatwaves, which had been dragging on for almost two weeks.

  ‘Don’t sound so pleased,’ said Simmons.

  ‘What time is it?’ yawned Wolf.

  ‘Ten to four.’

  ‘Aren’t I off this weekend?’

  ‘Not any more. I need you to join me at a crime scene.’

  ‘Next to your desk?’ asked Wolf, only half-joking as he hadn’t seen his boss leave the office in years.

  ‘Funny. They let me out for this one.’

  ‘That bad, huh?’

  There was a pause on the other end of the line before Simmons answered: ‘It’s pretty bad. Got a pen?’

  Wolf rummaged through one of the stacked boxes in the doorway and found a biro to scribble on the back of his hand with.

  ‘OK. Go ahead.’

  Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a light flickering across his kitchen cupboard.

  ‘Flat 108 …’ started Simmons.

  As Wolf walked into his ill-equipped kitchenette, he was dazzled by blue flashing lights strobing through the small window.

  ‘… Trinity Towers-’

  ‘Hibbard Road, Kentish Town?’ Wolf interrupted, peering down over dozens of police car
s, reporters, and the evacuated residents of the block opposite.

  ‘How the hell did you know that?’

  ‘I am a detective.’

  ‘Well, you can also be our number one suspect then. Get down here.’

  ‘Will do. I just need to …’ Wolf trailed off, realising that Simmons had already hung up.

  Between the intermittent flashes, he noticed the steady orange light coming from the washing machine and remembered that he had put his work clothes in before going to bed. He looked around at the dozens of identical cardboard boxes lining the walls:

  ‘Bollocks.’

  Five minutes later Wolf was pushing his way through the crowd of spectators that had congregated outside his building. He approached a police officer and flashed his warrant card, expecting to stroll straight through the cordon; however, the young constable snatched the card out of his hand and examined it closely, glancing up sceptically at the imposing figure dressed in swimming shorts and a faded ’93 Bon Jovi: Keep the Faith tour T-shirt.

  ‘Officer Layton-Fawkes?’ the constable asked doubtfully.

  Wolf winced at the sound of his own pretentious name:

  ‘Detective Sergeant Fawkes, yes.’

  ‘As in - Courtroom-Massacre Fawkes?’

  ‘It’s pronounced William … May I?’ Wolf gestured towards the apartment building.

  The young man handed Wolf’s warrant card back and held the tape up for him to pass under.

  ‘Need me to show you up?’ he asked.

  Wolf glanced down at his floral shorts, bare knees and work shoes.

  ‘You know what? I think I’m doing pretty well by myself.’

  The officer grinned.

  ‘Fourth floor,’ he told Wolf. ‘And be careful heading up there alone; it’s a shitty neighbourhood.’

  Wolf sighed heavily once more, entered through the bleach- fragranced hallway, and stepped into the lift. The buttons for the second and fifth floors were missing and a brown liquid had dried over the remainder of the control panel. Using all of his detective skills to ascertain that it was either poo, rust or Coca-Cola, he used the bottom of his T-shirt, Richie Sambora’s face, to push the button.