by Daniel Cole
“I’m ready when you are,” said Baxter, who looked a tad crazed now that her eyes were bloodshot and inflamed. “Should we wait for Curtis?”
“She said to go on without her.”
She was a little surprised that the FBI agent would volunteer to miss out on her own crime scene but decided not to push the matter:
“Then let’s.”
Baxter and Rouche stared up at the two bodies dangling six feet apart above their heads. She noticed that he was holding his chest again. They had managed to persuade the lead detective to give them five minutes alone with the scene before he and his team took over.
Entirely protected from the elements by the numerous security doors and quite sensible lack of opening windows, the bodies hung surreally still, suspended from opposite ends of the same piece of knotted material, which had been looped around the railings on the first floor.
Baxter was too disturbed by the macabre scene to feel the weight lift off her shoulders: whatever Masse had or had not known was irrelevant now.
She was safe.
“So when we both told Curtis that your case and my case were in no way related, it actually turns out that they really, really are,” said Baxter flippantly. “‘Bait,’” she read aloud. The scruffily scrawled letters on Masse’s chest now looked black with congealed blood. “Just like the other one.”
She moved position to look up at Dominic Burrell’s muscular body, also stripped to the waist, also sporting a mutilated message across his chest.
“‘Puppet,’” she read. “That’s new, right?”
Rouche shrugged noncommittally.
“Right?” Baxter asked again.
“I think we’d better talk to Curtis.”
Baxter and Rouche returned to the medical center to find that Curtis was feeling much better. In fact, she was in the middle of conducting an interview with a handsome man in his late thirties, dressed in civilian clothes, and whose mid-length, dark brown hair flopped down loosely in a style that looked a little young for him.
Not wanting to interrupt, Rouche went to make them another coffee. Not hesitating to interrupt, Baxter didn’t:
“You good?” she asked Curtis, who looked a touch annoyed at having to pause midsentence.
“Yes. Thank you,” she replied, dismissing Baxter as politely as possible.
Making an inquiring gesture toward the attractive man, Baxter felt as though she were caught between two supermodels—the three-meter gap between them and the doorway hadn’t done him justice.
“This is . . .” Curtis started reluctantly.
“Alexei Green.” The man smiled. He got to his feet and shook her hand firmly. “And you, of course, are the famous Emily Baxter. It’s an honor.”
“Mutually,” Baxter replied nonsensically, his stupid cheekbones putting her off.
Going red, she quickly excused herself and hurried off after Rouche.
Five minutes later, Curtis was still engrossed in the interview. In fact, unless Baxter was mistaken, the straitlaced agent appeared to be flirting.
“Do you know what?” said Rouche. “Screw it. We need to bring you up to speed, especially now. Let’s talk outside.”
They stepped out into the crisp but sunny afternoon. Baxter pulled her bobble hat back over her head.
“Where to start?” he started somewhat unsurely. “The banker William Fawkes, who was strung up on the Brooklyn Bridge—”
“Mind if we just call him ‘the Banker’ from now on?” asked Baxter.
“Sure . . . We believe he had one arm hanging loose because his killer didn’t finish. This is backed up by eyewitness reports describing someone or something falling from the bridge into the East River.”
“Is it possible they survived the fall?” Baxter asked, pulling her hat down to cover even more of her frozen face.
“No,” replied Rouche decisively. “One, it’s roughly a hundred-and-fifty-foot drop. Two, New York was knocking minus nine degrees that night: the river was frozen solid. Three, and most significantly, the body washed up the next morning. And you’ll never guess what he had scarred across his chest . . .”
“‘Puppet,’” they chimed together.
“So we’ve got two dead victims with the same word carved into them, two dead killers with a different word carved into them, taking place on opposite sides of the Atlantic?” summarized Baxter.
“No,” said Rouche, tucking his cold hands under his armpits. “You’re forgetting about the one Curtis mentioned yesterday that we’ve kept under wraps so far, the one we brought you in to help us investigate.”
“Making this victim and killer number three.”
“All murder-suicides, just like today,” Rouche added.
Baxter looked surprised:
“Any theories yet?”
“Only that things are likely to get a hell of a lot worse before they get any better. After all, we’re chasing ghosts, aren’t we?”
Rouche poured the rest of his tasteless coffee onto the ground. It sizzled and steamed like acid. He closed his eyes and tilted his head up into the sun before pondering out loud:
“How do you catch a killer who’s already dead?”
Chapter 6
Wednesday, 9 December 2015
7:34 P.M.
Baxter managed to open the front door to Thomas’s house just using her chin and stumbled into the hallway holding a cat carrier in one hand and a Waitrose bag in the other.
“Just me!” she called out to no response.
As the downstairs lights were on, she knew that Thomas was home. The television chatted quietly to itself as she walked muddy footprints through to the kitchen. She placed the shopping bag and the cat down on the table, then poured herself a large glass of red wine.
She slumped into one of the chairs, kicked off her boots, and massaged her aching feet as she stared out at the dark garden. The house was blissfully quiet, bar the comforting hum of the heating firing back up and the muffled rain of the upstairs shower through the floorboards.
She removed the family-sized bags of Monster Munch and Cadbury’s Buttons from her shopping bag but was distracted by her own ghostly reflection in the black windows. She realized that this was the first time she had seen herself since the ordeal earlier that day and totted up the numerous scratches that covered her face and neck, the long, weeping graze across her forehead only counting as one. She shuddered as she remembered the hands clawing at her, dragging her across the floor, the helplessness she had felt on kicking one malevolent face away just for it to be replaced by another.
She had showered twice before leaving her apartment and still felt dirty. She rubbed her face wearily and ran her hands through her damp hair before topping up her glass.
Ten minutes later, Thomas entered the kitchen in his dressing gown.
“Hey. I didn’t think you were coming over ton—” He stopped short when he saw the cuts decorating her face. He rushed across the room and sat down beside her. “Jesus! Are you all right?”
He took one of her crisp-dusted hands in his and squeezed it gently. Baxter forced an appreciative smile and wriggled it out of his grasp, picking up her wineglass as an excuse for not wanting to be touched.
“What happened?” he asked.
Thomas was an unfailingly mild-mannered man, except when it came to his borderline overprotectiveness of Baxter. The last time she had returned home with a split lip, he had used all of his influence as a lawyer to make her assailant’s time in custody as miserable as possible, and to ensure he was sentenced to the maximum term at the end of it.
She actually considered confiding in him for a moment.
“It’s nothing.” She smiled weakly. “Got involved in a fight at the office. Should’ve just left them to it.”
She watched Thomas relax a little, satisfied in the knowledge that no one had deliberately tried to hurt her.
Desperate to know more but picking up on Baxter’s reluctance to elaborate, he helped himself to a crisp.
>
“Starter, main, or dessert?” he asked, gesturing to the bag.
She tapped the open bottle of wine: “Starter.”
She pointed to the enormous bag of Monster Munch: “Main.”
She picked up the bag of Buttons: “Dessert.”
Thomas smiled fondly at her and leaped to his feet.
“Let me make you something.”
“No, I’m fine. I’m not really hungry.”
“Just an omelet. It’ll take five minutes,” he said, already setting to work on the emergency dinner. He glanced at the cat carrier on the kitchen table. “What’s in the box?”
“Cat,” replied Baxter automatically, hoping that she was right: Echo had been uncharacteristically quiet since arriving at the house.
It suddenly occurred to her that it might have been polite to ask him whether he was prepared to look after her pet while she was away before turning up with it. It then occurred to her that she had never actually told him, out loud, that she was going away.
She really couldn’t be bothered to get into an argument.
“And as much of a pleasure as it always is to see Echo,” started Thomas, his tone changing already, “how come he decided to pop across town on such a chilly evening?”
Baxter figured that she might as well get it over with.
“I’ve been seconded indefinitely to work with the FBI and CIA on a high-profile murder case. I’m flying out to New York in the morning and have no idea when I’ll be home.”
She let that sink in for a few moments.
Thomas had gone very quiet.
“Anything else?” he asked.
“Yeah. I forgot Echo’s food, so you’ll have to get some. Oh, and don’t forget to give him his pills.” She rummaged around in her bag, then shook the box in her left hand: “Mouth.” And then the box in her right: “Butt.”
She could see Thomas grinding his teeth as he banged the pan around on the metal hob. Oil splashed and hissed as it escaped the nonstick confines of Jamie Oliver’s invention.
Baxter got up: “I need to make a call.”
“I’m making you dinner!” snapped Thomas as he pelted the pan with grated cheese.
“I don’t want your bloody angry omelet,” she snapped right back at him before heading upstairs to talk to Edmunds in private.
Edmunds had just been peed on.
Tia had taken over nappy duties while he went to change his shirt. He was carrying the soiled garment to the washing machine when his phone went off.
“Baxter?” he answered while washing his hands.
“Hey,” she greeted him casually. “Got a minute?”
“Sure.”
“So . . . interesting day.”
Edmunds listened attentively as she gave a detailed account of her time at the prison. She also passed on the limited information that Rouche had shared with her outside in the grounds.
“A cult?” he suggested sensibly once she had finished.
“Certainly seems the most likely explanation, but apparently the Americans have whole teams assigned to cult activities and religious sects. They’ve said the murders don’t fit with any of the groups they’re monitoring.”
“I don’t like this whole ‘Bait’ thing. It was one thing killing someone with Wolf’s name, but now they’ve managed to get to Masse. It feels like that message is for you, and if it is, you’re involved now. You’re giving them exactly what they want.”
“I agree it’s one possibility, but what else can I do?”
“Alex!” Tia called from the bedroom.
“Just a minute!” Edmunds shouted back.
The neighbor next door thumped against the wall.
“She’s peed on me too now!” yelled Tia.
“OK!” Edmunds called back in frustration.
The neighbor started thumping again, knocking a family photograph clean off the shelf.
“Sorry about that,” he said to Baxter.
“Would it be OK to call you when I’ve got more?” she asked.
“Of course. Be really careful over there.”
“Don’t worry—I’ll be on twenty-four-hour Puppet watch,” she assured him.
“Actually,” said Edmunds, his tone deadly serious, “I think we need to be more concerned about whoever it is who’s holding the strings.”
The moment Baxter reached the bottom of the staircase, she knew that an argument with Thomas would be unavoidable. The television had been paused. Andrea was frozen mid-report, and the headline at the bottom of the screen read:
Ragdoll Killer dead following visit from Chief Inspector
She really hated that woman.
“You went to see Lethaniel Masse today?” Thomas asked quietly from somewhere inside the room.
Baxter huffed and entered the living room. Thomas was sat in his chair with the remainder of the bottle of wine.
“Uh-huh.” Baxter nodded as though it were of no importance.
“You didn’t tell me.”
“Don’t see why I would.” She shrugged.
“No. Why would you? Why would you?!” shouted Thomas, getting up. “Just like why would you tell me that there was a riot there today?”
“I wasn’t involved in that,” she lied.
“Bullshit!”
Baxter was a little taken aback. Thomas hardly ever swore.
“You turn up here battered and bleeding . . .”
“It’s a few scratches.”
“. . . risking your life among out-of-control prisoners because you were paying a visit to the most dangerous man in the entire country!”
“I don’t have time for this,” said Baxter, fetching her coat.
“Well, of course you don’t,” yelled Thomas in frustration as he followed her into the kitchen. “You’ve got a flight to New York in the morning, which you also neglected to tell me about.” He paused. “Emily, I don’t understand why you feel you can’t share these things with me,” he said softly.
“Can we talk about this when I get back?” she asked, matching his calm tone.
Thomas looked at her for a long moment and then nodded in defeat as she slipped her boots back on.
“Look after Echo for me,” she said.
She got up and walked out to the hallway. Thomas smiled as she pulled on the matching hat and gloves that he had bought for her as a joke. It was baffling to him that this woman, attempting to blow the hair out of her eyes as a pompom wobbled on top of her head, could have gained such a formidable reputation among the few colleagues whom she had permitted him to meet.
She reached for the door.
“What on earth is this case you’ve been asked to help with?” he blurted.
They both knew that it was more than just a passing question: it was a plea for her to open up to him before she left; it was an opportunity for her to prove that things would be different from now on; it was him asking whether they could ever have a future together.
She gave him a peck on the cheek.
The door clicked shut behind her.
Rouche was woken by the sound of “Air Hostess” by Busted buzzing out of his mobile phone. He answered it as quickly as he could to hush the irritating ringtone.
“Rouche,” he said in a hoarse whisper.
“Rouche, it’s Curtis.”
“Is everything all right?” he asked urgently.
“Yes. Fine. I didn’t wake the family, did I?”
“No.” He yawned as he made his way downstairs to the kitchen. “Don’t worry—they’d sleep through anything. What’s up?”
“I couldn’t remember whether we were picking you up at six thirty or seven tomorrow.”
“Seven,” Rouche answered pleasantly, checking the time.
It was 2:52 A.M.
“Oh, right,” she mumbled. “I thought it might have been six thirty.”
Rouche suspected that this had not been the real purpose of her unsociably timed call. When she remained silent, he sat down on the cold floor and made himself
comfortable.
“Scary day,” he said. “It was good to get home and talk it through with someone.”
He allowed the silence to run its course, giving his colleague the opportunity to seize the prompt should she want to.
“I . . . um . . . I don’t really have anyone,” she finally admitted.
She spoke so softly that he could barely hear her.
“You’re a long way from home,” he reasoned.
“That doesn’t really . . . I still wouldn’t have anybody.”
He waited for her to continue.
“The job just takes precedence over everything else. I wouldn’t have the time it takes to cultivate a relationship. I’ve lost touch with almost all my friends.”
“What do your family say about it?” he asked, hoping he wasn’t putting his foot in it.
Curtis sighed heavily. He winced.
“They’d say I’ve got the right work ethic. I’m just in the wrong job.”
Rouche adjusted position to huddle up against the cold, knocking over a broken cupboard door, which in turn toppled a pile of tiles across the dusty room.
“Shit.”
“What was that?” asked Curtis.
“Sorry. We’re redoing the kitchen and it’s a bit of a mess,” he told her. “So tell me about your family.”
They talked about nothing in particular until Curtis’s murmured responses faded into silence. He listened to her shallow breaths and tiny snores for a while, finding the sound a surreally peaceful way to finish such a traumatic day.
Eventually, he hung up.
Too tired to make the arduous journey back upstairs, he rested his head against the cupboard, closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep amid the splintered units and exposed concrete at the heart of his home.
Chapter 7
Thursday, 10 December 2015
2:16 P.M.
14:16 12-10-2015 -5°C/23°F
Baxter watched the numbers on the dashboard display blink in warning from her warm seat in the back of the FBI vehicle. She glanced down at her own watch, realizing that she had forgotten to reset it on the plane as it still read “7:16 P.M.” She must have missed the announcement. All three of them had slept through the seven-and-a-half-hour flight following their night of broken sleep.