The Taken: DI Erica Martin Book 2 (Erica Martin Thriller)

by Alice Clark-Platts

  Martin noticed that this clip didn’t come from the official Deucalion Church website. This had been uploaded by someone anonymously, someone who had just turned up and managed to secretly film what was going on.

  Snow professed to enable the lame to walk; he made a deaf woman hear, a blind man see. All pretty much end-of-the-pier stuff; things that Martin could have pulled apart in an instant if she’d have had five minutes with one of these people. If she’d been able to show them that the healing of a supposed arthritic crippled leg was merely a tugging down of a shoe to give the illusion of the leg lengthening; that the cure for deafness was achieved by carefully choosing from the audience someone with impaired hearing as opposed to complete silence – they would react to loud clicks and bangs. And many healings of the spirit were merely to do with the manipulation of hope. Something it seemed that Tristan Snow was expert in.

  The exorcisms were trickier to debunk, other than to dismiss them as pure nonsense. But it was hard to reconcile the sight of an adult flailing wildly, being calmed by the words Snow uttered. Why would anyone agree to take part in this spectacle? Did they honestly believe that they were possessed by the Devil?

  Martin wondered if videos existed of child exorcisms; the ones on YouTube only involved adults. She suspected, if there were any, that they wouldn’t be publicized – that would have been a red flag to social services. But the articles on his website, the books he self-published on Amazon, were all filled with methods of ‘training up’ children; turning them to the ways of the Lord.

  This side to Snow’s ministry, or whatever you wanted to call it, had only developed after he had left his job on morning television. It seemed unlikely that even producers of anodyne TV shows would approve of this kind of hocus pocus.

  Martin pondered as she sipped at her coffee, long gone cold, on the reasons people had for coming to Snow, for succumbing to his spiel. True, he was a charismatic speaker. He had a certain kudos from his media career. But were these people so stupid as to think that just because the guy had been on TV, he had a direct chatline with their God? That through his hands and nothing more, he could actually beat modern medicine at its own game? That he could defeat death? Were these people so hopeless, so downtrodden, that they had resorted to magic to get them through their lives? That living entirely reliant on fantasy made up for some deeper chasm within them, something they didn’t or couldn’t admit, even to themselves?

  Martin switched off the computer eventually. She couldn’t bring herself to watch any more. She looked at her phone, where Sam had texted to say he would head to her place after work. She’d given him her spare key just before he’d asked her to Crete. It felt weird, looking at his text. It reminded her of Jim. And also spurred a feeling in her, one she wasn’t certain of . . . that someone was in her space again. Part of her felt good about it, a settling into comfort, a zone of content. But another part of her kicked against it.

  And she hated that part of her.

  He was sitting in the dark when she got back, watching a murmuring chat show, an empty whisky glass lolling in his hand. He looked up as Martin came into the lounge.

  ‘Top-up?’ she asked, moving over to the shelf where she kept the bottles of spirits and retrieving the Talisker.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘What are you watching?’

  Sam ignored the question. ‘Partridge and the SOCOs did well to find that cross. You’ve brought the girl in?’

  Martin sighed and sat down in the armchair next to Sam’s. The TV continued to throw light on their faces, occasional laughter puncturing the silence. ‘She was meek and mild as could be.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘I’ve got to be up at six. We’ll interview her first thing.’

  Martin looked over at Sam. She wanted to ask him, lay it all out on the line. Was there any point to this, or were they just going to turn out like her and Jim, sat in a darkened room with a TV on that neither of them watched? Instead, she relied on her old friend booze and took a long drink.

  ‘How are we doing, Erica?’ he asked, scrutinizing her. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Fine. Right as rain. Why?’

  ‘You’re closing off from me.’ He sighed. ‘I know you. Remember when we first met?’

  Martin thought back to that time in Newcastle over ten years ago – when she was in uniform and he was, again, her boss.

  ‘Remember?’ Sam persisted. ‘When I asked you out? We were in The Windmill. It was a Thursday.’

  ‘You remember the day?’

  Sam didn’t answer.

  ‘I said no to you,’ Martin replied, her head on one side.

  ‘Yep. You didn’t want to know.’

  ‘You were my boss . . .’

  ‘I’m still your boss.’

  ‘You had a reputation. Everyone fancied you.’ Martin looked at him. ‘Ah, don’t get too up yourself,’ she said, smiling. ‘But they did. I didn’t want to be one of many.’

  Sam got to his feet and switched off the television. They were now in darkness, the glow of the street lamps spilling into the room.

  ‘You had that same look then,’ Sam said softly at Martin’s back. He touched her hair, resting his hand on the top of her head and then her shoulder. She reached up and put her hand on his. ‘Closed off and far away. Not letting yourself have something that you really want.’

  She hesitated a second before saying, ‘When we thought . . . before Crete . . . when we thought I might be . . .’

  ‘Pregnant?’

  Martin nodded. ‘What . . . would you have wanted it?’ Her breath caught in her mouth, her heart beating loud under her shirt.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sam said gently. ‘Honestly, it would have been a big thing to happen so soon. With things so up in the air.’

  Martin exhaled quietly, her glass hanging from her hand.

  ‘But that’s not to say things wouldn’t change,’ Sam said, coming round to kneel in front of her. ‘I mean, you said you were relieved. I thought . . . Things are such early days, Erica. You’re just out of a relationship. We don’t even live together,’ he gave a little laugh.

  ‘I know,’ Martin acknowledged.

  ‘Let’s just see how things go? Get things settled with Jim. Get the divorce finalized. Take things slowly,’ he said rubbing her hand with his thumb.

  ‘Right,’ Martin said.

  ‘Don’t close down. You know? Don’t shut off from me. Please, Erica. We can have anything you want. I promise.’

  ‘And what do I want?’ Martin asked, thinking as she did that she didn’t believe him. Not really.

  ‘Did you text Jim back?’

  ‘What do I want, Sam?’

  He got to his feet and moved to the doorway, stood silhouetted in the light from the hallway. ‘I don’t know, Erica,’ he said, as he turned to go up the stairs. ‘Just come to bed.’

  Martin heard his footsteps overhead in her bedroom as she finished her drink and poured another. And another, as she sat alone in the dark while he slept.

  19

  Violet’s arms were bare. She wore a white shift dress which hung limply from her thin shoulders. Her black hair cut into her cheekbones, emphasizing her smallness somehow, her cap of hair encasing her, holding her taut. Martin sat opposite with Jones next to her. Violet’s solicitor was inert in a corner, a Starbucks cup on the floor beside him, a notebook on his lap. The tape spools whirled, the air-conditioning hummed.

  ‘You had it fixed then?’ Violet shivered a little, jutting her chin towards the wall where the air-con vents blew their recycled oxygen.

  ‘Are you too cold?’

  Violet shook her head. Her hands rested on her lap. Her face was calm in repose, eyes down, mouth closed. A Piero della Francesca, Martin thought; Mary at the birth of Jesus. Martin pushed the plastic bag containing the exorcism cross over the table towards her.

  ‘Do you recognize this, Violet? I’m showing Violet Exhibit D3,’ Martin said, for the benefit of the tape.

  Vi
olet put her head to one side. ‘It’s my father’s,’ she answered, cool as the room in which she sat.

  Martin considered her lack of reaction, her watchfulness. Either she was a bloody brilliant actress or she had no idea of the significance of the cross. ‘He would use it to pray with?’ she asked, fishing.

  Violet appraised her for a moment, weighing something up. ‘Yes, he would use it for prayer,’ she answered eventually.

  There’s the lie, Martin thought. She shifted on her chair. She needed to get a purchase on this. She focused on the girl. Everything else: Sam; her divorce; all of it, dissipated into the air of the interview room. She saw only Violet. Her black eyes a meditation. Through them she would find Tristan’s killer.

  ‘For prayer, Violet? Or something else?’

  Violet shrugged. ‘Often my dad did things I didn’t know about.’

  Martin frowned. That sounded as if Violet were leading them to something. She thought back to the original interview. It’s all there for you to see, Violet had said, referring to Snow’s YouTube channel. Was there more to it than that? Martin leaned back in her chair, picked up a pen which lay before her on the desk and started tapping her knee with it.

  Violet’s eyes moved down to the pen. She gave a brief smile. ‘Do you attend church, Inspector?’ The question came out of the blue.

  Martin gave a look of surprise. ‘I did as a kid. Not now.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Martin took a breath. If this was what it took, she would answer. ‘Not sure if I believe. Not in need of it so much.’

  ‘Not sure . . . not so much,’ the girl parroted, her eyes wide. ‘Doesn’t sound like you’re certain about your relationship with God.’

  Martin gave an easy shrug. ‘It’s not something I think about,’ she said, tapping her pen again. ‘What about you?’ she asked lightly. ‘Do you believe?’

  Violet leaned forward, putting her elbows on the table. She rubbed the corner of one eye and looked disarmingly at Martin. ‘I should do, right? The way I’ve been brought up. I’ve had it shoved down my throat twenty-four seven . . . The truth is, I used to. My father would tell me that the Devil was inside me. He was inside all of us. That the only way we could be clean was to seek forgiveness.’ She paused for a moment. ‘The thing was, though,’ she said, leaning back in her chair, ‘you could only get that forgiveness through him.’

  ‘And you didn’t like that? Having to go through him?’

  ‘No. I didn’t. It demeans it. Makes it more about him than you. Or God.’

  ‘So would you say you’ve lost your faith?’

  ‘One day . . . it just left me, you know?’ Violet gestured at her midriff. ‘Once it was there, heavy inside, like a weight. And then, it just went.’ She clicked her fingers. ‘Like that. That was a good day. I was light as air,’ she smiled. She was outwardly calm but there was an unyielding euphoria about her; a glass veneer that shone with hostility. Martin had the feeling that were she to put any pressure on it at all, it would splinter into a million pieces.

  Martin knew where she wanted this interview to end up; she started the journey. She nudged the cross nearer to Violet. ‘The reason we brought you here last night, why you’re under arrest, is that this cross was found in a dustbin outside the Riverview boarding house.’

  Violet moved her eyes to the bag and back again to Martin. ‘And?’

  Martin pulled out the other plastic bag, the one containing the nightdress. ‘I’m now showing Violet Exhibit D4,’ she said, moving it across the table. ‘Do you recognize this, Violet?’

  She waited as the girl stared at the bag. ‘It’s my nightdress, I think. Why have you got it?’

  ‘Do you remember the last time you saw this nightdress?’

  ‘Uh . . .’ Violet flung a look to her solicitor.

  ‘Inspector Martin,’ he said, with a jaded weariness. ‘You didn’t inform me that you would be showing my client this.’

  ‘I’m informing you now,’ Martin replied. ‘When did you last see this nightdress, Violet?’

  ‘You don’t have to answer, Miss Snow.’

  Martin examined Violet’s face. Her confusion appeared to be genuine.

  ‘I don’t know. What are those stains on it?’

  Martin said nothing.

  Violet flushed. ‘Uh, it was in my drawer I think. I left it there when I unpacked. I wasn’t wearing that one to sleep in.’

  ‘You’re sure about that? You didn’t see it yesterday morning? When you went into your father’s room?’

  Violet shook her head. ‘Why would I take my nightdress into Dad’s room? I was holding the tea. There’s no reason . . .’

  ‘So, if I were to tell you, Violet, that this nightdress – Exhibit D4 – was found wrapped around the cross that you’ve seen – in the dustbin – you couldn’t offer an explanation for that?’

  ‘What – no! Of course I couldn’t. That’s . . . why would you think that? Why would I be able to?’

  ‘You didn’t enter your father’s room, with the cross in your hand? Smash it into his skull, and then carefully wrap it up in the nightie? Run outside and throw it away before coming back in to wake your mother up? Tell her that you’d found your father dead?’

  ‘God, no!’ Violet exclaimed, her eyes darting to different points in the room, desperately trying to think of a response. ‘Someone must have stolen it,’ she said, looking at Jones quickly, pulling her in. ‘You know, put it round the cross to get me into trouble.’

  ‘Who would want to do that, Violet?’ Jones asked.

  ‘I don’t know . . . Because someone wants to make out it was me who killed him?’ Violet had turned white, a sickly colour. ‘But it wasn’t! I can’t think. You’re frightening me. Look, I had issues with my father. You can see that. But plenty of other people didn’t like him, too.’

  ‘Who didn’t like your father, Violet?’ Martin asked, pushing on.

  The girl began to cry. Martin watched the tears drop. She was just a child, after all.

  ‘Loads of people. Antonia for a start . . . Fraser. You must see that,’ she looked up at Martin, rubbed her hand across her wet cheeks. ‘Everyone in that place, in the B&B, hated him.’

  ‘Your mother?’

  ‘No. Not her . . . other people. People from back home. He did things . . . he hurt people. You must see. I’ve told you . . . on YouTube. It’s all there. What he did . . .’ Violet dissolved into sobs, her hands over her face.

  ‘Talk to me then,’ Martin said, her face unreadable. ‘If you know something about another person, you have to tell me. And you have to do it now, because things aren’t looking good for you, Violet. Not good at all, I’m afraid.’

  Violet swallowed, her eyes wide, as she stepped on to the bridge of no return. ‘Mercy. Her name is Mercy Fletcher. It all started with her. Years ago. If she hadn’t come along . . . She was my friend. And then . . .’ she stared at Martin, with waterwheel eyes. ‘And that was when it all went wrong.’

  ‘Talk to me, Violet,’ Martin asked gently. ‘Tell me what happened.’

  You didn’t come.

  You cried off, saying you had things to do back at the church. I knew it was a lie. I think – now – it was because you’d already worked out what was going on. That you couldn’t bear to face it. As always, I was the idiot. The one that turned to face the storm and bore the brunt of the weather.

  There we were, in Margate. Another show, another theatre. Violet was shivering at the shoreline. Her lips blue and her arms wrapped around her thin frame. The sea was the colour of an Orkney seal, slick and lively.

  Mercy was there – yelling at her from the water, her head bobbing amidst the springing waves. ‘It’s not so bad once you’re in! Your body sort of goes numb. You can’t feel yourself. It’s really nice!’

  We – her father and I – sat in deckchairs, up the beach, covered in a blanket, a Thermos flask at our feet. Fraser was, of course, sensibly back at the hotel.

  ‘Go on with you, Violet! D
on’t be so pathetic!’ I remember Tristan calling.

  I could tell, just from the sight of Violet’s rigid back, that she didn’t want to go in. She was jumping up and down on the spot. I could feel her thoughts. I always knew my daughter. Who in their right mind wants to go swimming in the North Sea in December? The sand was like mud beneath our feet, the sky bearded with clouds, pushing down on us, giving me a headache.

  Violet went for it! She ran in, the icy water must have grasped at her heart as she plunged through the surf. I trembled at the thought of it.

  ‘Told you!’ I heard Mercy shout, a typically sloppy grin on her face. I glanced to my left where Tristan sat forward, his elbows on his knees, peering at them both through the greyness.

  ‘It’s horrible,’ Violet called to us, with chattering teeth. ‘Can we get out now?’

  ‘Lame,’ Mercy yelled, before making a porpoise dive under an approaching wave, her bottom raised in the air for a second, before flattening out under the water. She emerged, murmuring something I couldn’t hear, pushing wet strings of hair from her eyes.

  I got up and waved at them to come in. It was too cold. I didn’t want Violet to get ill. Seagulls squawked above us, wheeling down to where Tristan had tossed the remains of his chips. I looked along at the bleak curve of the beach, which led to a promontory stretching out into the sea, its clock tower marking the hours and minutes we would have to stay in that town, with this atmosphere.

  Where were you, Antonia? Having your nails done? Going to one of those bars you liked so much with the cocktails filled with ice which glittered like diamonds?

  At first, Violet and Mercy had been excited about the trip. They were only ten years old, after all. They’d gabbled in the car about eating rock, scoffing fish and chips, spending money on arcade games, drinking Fanta through a straw. Like home, like Blackpool, they chattered, but somehow better because they were on holiday. They called each other sisters. Makes you laugh that, doesn’t it, Antonia?

  Sisters.

  They raced up the beach, dripping wet. Their skin was blue, shuddering and goose-bumped from the cold. I handed Violet a towel and she rubbed it hard over her skin, bringing it back to life.