by Valerie Laws
She reached down into her bag and produced a nitrile glove. ‘See how useful it is to be a doctor’s widow and a trained nurse. It won’t hurt, I promise you.’ She shook the bag almost playfully. ‘I’ve got no nails in here!’ She manoeuvred her left hand into the glove using her small white teeth to hold it.
‘Tessa, how will you get away with this?’
‘Why, easily, as always. Just like Robert got away with breaking my arm. No-one knows I’m here. I haven’t gone back to work officially yet!’
Erica should have known. The perfume, the jewellery.
‘But I know this is a quiet time, I just walked in in my old uniform – and a wig, which I whipped off just before I came in here. I really did come to visit you, bring you magazines. Before I visit Harry Archer. And that’s a mercy killing you know.’ She shook her bag again. ‘It’s high time security was stepped up here. It’s not safe for patients. I’ll just leave when all the visitors pile in.’
As she spoke, she pulled a syringe out of her bag.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Keep her talking Erica. ‘But why did you go back Tessa? If you were so scared of him? Why go back alone without Tara?’
‘To get this, of course.’ Tessa held up her hand, the one with the ring. ‘My Tiffany ring. Tara asked for my personal things, the ones I’d left when I moved out in a hurry, but this one he said he knew nothing about. Then when Tara was out of earshot, he whispered to me that he’d still got it, but if I didn’t go back to him by the end of the week, it was going down the toilet. My beautiful ring! It cost over five thousand pounds! I just had to get it back. When I’d finished with him, I found it. I told Tara a couple of days later I’d found it had been mixed up in the stuff he gave us back that afternoon. My lucky ring! It gave me Robert, and then it gave me freedom from him.
‘And now,’
Keep her talking! ‘So you entered and left by the back door. But the front door was unlocked when I arrived.’
‘You do like your t’s crossed! Yes well I knew it was the cleaner’s holiday - shame really, I’d love her to have found him, the foul bitch. She worshipped Robert! Anyway, I didn’t want to risk him lying dead for days. Not very nice, in my house.’ An echo of Lady Macbeth. How practical Tessa had turned out to be, when her material comfort or gain was involved.
‘And it was me who was his first appointment. Lucky me.’
‘Yes, I saw your name on his list. I was glad about that. I mean, knowing how strong you are, I knew you’d cope. Wouldn’t want some poor old arthritis patient finding him. That would be cruel. Now I must get on. I’ll just inject this where you’ve already got needle tracks from the antibiotic. In your left arm I think. I won’t tell you what it is, but it’s painless as I said. I hadn’t planned this, but I can use a pillow for poor old Harry. I nicked this stuff from Robert’s stash. He might have killed me with it one day.’
Erica felt sad as much as frightened. Weary. She’d fought for her life against the North Sea, against Archer, and now she’d have to do it again. This was someone she knew, someone she’d tried to protect. But she’d have to fight, if only to leave some forensic evidence. Some of Tessa’s DNA had to be found somewhere on her whatever the outcome.
‘Do you think I’m just going to lie here and take it? If we fight, it’ll not look like natural causes, will it?’ Her right arm had gone numb. Why didn’t someone come in?
Tessa looked down at her, still pretty, smiling. She stroked Erica’s cheek. Her hand with the nitrile skin felt smooth and dead. ‘I’d really rather not do this Erica. Honestly.’
Tessa was strong. And she hadn’t just fought the sea. Her left hand would be free to plunge the syringe into Erica’s injured arm just above the plaster cast, holding it still with her right hand.
‘Tessa, you say you’ve taken control, but can’t you see you’re out of control? Can’t you see what you’ve turned into? Can’t you see you’ve turned into something worse than Robert Kingston! You’re not fit to have a child!’
Anger flared in the soft blue eyes for the first time. She grabbed for Erica’s neck with her free hand.
‘Don’t make me want to hurt you!’ she grunted. Erica twisted her head down to her shoulder, and her hair, long and thick, got in Tessa’s way. She grabbed a handful of it and pulled Erica’s head up. She writhed under Tessa, using the momentary relaxing of pressure, spread her thighs and got her legs round her. She squeezed Tessa with her strong thighs, trying to kick the backs of her calves though with bare feet it was of limited use. She felt like she was being scalped. Giving up the neck hold, furious now at her resistance, Tessa stabbed down with the needle, and Erica jerked her left arm just enough to meet it with her plaster cast. A jarring pain shot through her, but she didn’t feel the needle, as the syringe hit the floor.
‘I could have done this when I was doing your hair, but I didn’t think I’d have to kill you, Erica, I really, really tried not to! It’s your own fault! You could have let me go on! We could both be helping people!’
She grabbed Erica’s plastered arm and started smashing it against the bed bars. Erica nearly passed out but kept holding on with her legs. Suddenly, looking across for the syringe, Tessa glanced inside the open locker compartment and froze.
‘You treacherous bitch!’ she yelled, and in that moment, Erica rolled them both off the bed, hoping Tessa would land underneath. She did. Hospitals have high beds and hard floors. They lay on the floor winded, Erica’s broken arm was in agony, and Tessa was getting a grip on her right arm again. Someone help me, I can’t manage this on my own, please, Erica prayed to anyone who’d listen.
‘Fuck me!’
The door banged into the bed, painfully ringing through Erica’s head which was against one of the wheels on the other side, as Stacey walked in and stared at the tangled mass of female limbs and mingled honey and ash blonde hair struggling on the floor.
‘Eee, Erica man, nowt wrong with a bit of girl on girl but why bother when there’s nee lads aroond to get turned on? Here’s yer hairdryer then.’ She dropped a carrier bag on the bed, followed by a large bunch of expensive flowers, dripping with water, and turned to go.
‘The syringe...’ Erica gasped, as she and Tracey wrestled.
Stacey looked and saw it. ‘Hard core!’ she said with respect.
‘Kick it away! Tessa’s the Operator!’
Tessa hit her hard across the face and started to beat her broken arm on the floor. Stacey stood there with her mouth open for a moment, then ‘Mint!’
‘Stacey, please help me!’
‘Nee bother!’
In one swift movement, Stacey had her phone out and was filming the struggle. ‘That’s the Operator attacking Erica Bruce! And me, Stacey Reed, to the rescue!’ she commentated. ‘Now haway ye psycho nutjob, gerroff me mate!’
Stacey reached down and hauled Tessa off Erica’s limp body, pushing her violently aside. The relief of having Tessa’s weight lifted from her felt like heaven to Erica. ‘Be careful... she’s a killer...’
Stacey put her phone in Erica’s good hand. ‘Hold this, man, and divven’t miss owt or Aa’ll kill ye meself!’
Erica was shaking too much to make an emergency call one-handed, so she just followed the action as best she could as Tessa turned and attacked Stacey, desperate and mad. This was a woman who’d killed three men, who’d pitilessly mutilated them as they died at her hands. She had nothing to lose now, desperate and at bay. She was fit, strong and insane, a screaming, biting, kicking mass of murderous intent. Stacey was an unfit, lazy smoker, but she was a Tyneside lass, veteran of years of drunken brawls and beating up abusive lads in clubs and taxi queues, used to brutal close quarters fighting, while Tessa had never faced a conscious uninjured victim. They clashed together, Tessa grabbing a lump of Stacey’s puffed-up black hair, which came off in her hand.
‘Ye bloody bitch, gerroff me extensions!’ And Stacey launched a meaty fist which smashed into Tessa’s nose. Blood spurted instantly, Tessa
’s hands went to her face as Stacey followed up with a vicious kick to the knee cap, and turning, an elbow to the belly before grabbing Tessa’s hair, from underneath at the nape in case of hair extensions, turning her and slamming her face-first into the wall. Tessa fell to the floor whimpering, blood gushing from her nose. Stacey almost casually pinned her to the floor, her knee in Tessa’s back.
‘This is the Operator, dangerous serial killer, captured by me, Stacey Reed,’ she announced, looking round to the camera, just as Will Bennett and Sally Banner rushed in.
‘Erica!’ Will sprang to lift Erica up and put her on the bed, to Sally’s disgust. Sally grabbed Stacey and tried to manhandle her off Tessa.
‘Come on now, that’s assault,’ she snapped.
‘Up yours Bizzy!’ snarled Stacey. ‘Aa’ve just caught the Operator for yiz, and that’s the thanks Aa get!’
Erica was still filming. Stacey, fully roused to ire, stood magnificent, solid as the Rock of Gibraltar (a local pub), bruised, bleeding, scratched, hair awry, ready to take on the world. ‘That murdering bitch was trying to kill Erica who found out her true identity! Crazy fucker’s been killing doctors aal ower the place, and where were ye then, man, woman!’
‘Stop filming,’ ordered Will, reaching for the phone. Erica tossed it feebly to Stacey. She’d earned her viral Youtube glory. ‘There’s no firm evidence that this is true.’
‘Shurrup man! It’s true, isn’t it Erica?’
‘Yes it’s true and yes there’s evidence. Full confession.’ Erica reached out for her voice recorder in the locker, which she’d turned on when reaching for her hand mirror, and which Tessa had spotted during the struggle.
Stacey punched the air. ‘Double fkn mint Back of the net!’
As Will and Sally lifted Tessa from the floor, her ruined face a mass of blood and snot, Stacey took a last shot and stopped filming. ‘Fag break!’ and she charged out of the room. In the comparative quiet, they heard a voice shout, ‘Nurse, NURSE! That’s the girl who stole my flowers!’ and Erica laughed until she cried, her damaged plaster leaking powder onto the flower-wetted sheets and her whole body shaking.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Erica lay on the high bed, her wounded wrist by her side, fingers curling out of the newly applied plaster like a hermit crab’s legs. Will had checked up on Erica’s idea, found out that Chambers had indeed done a vasectomy on Kingston, realised what a motive it gave Tessa for the first two murders, and returned to the hospital, though he’d rushed to check on Archer first, assuming he might be at risk. She tried not to think about the appalling aftermath of the struggle. Tessa’s arrest. What it would mean for Tara and her family. The ongoing suffering of the victims’ relatives. Craig Anderson was recovering slowly. It turned out one of his patients, who had refused conventional treatment on his advice, had died of cancer, leaving a distraught husband and a young son.
Under it all for Erica was the euphoria which goes with survival, the heartless primitive glee of knowing we’ll see the next lot of daffodils. It’d been a close thing, between her and Tessa, as between her and the sea.
Six weeks, she’d have the plaster on. And she was going home tomorrow. She studied a leaflet about a plastic sleeve-type structure which formed a watertight seal over a plaster cast so she could shower, and best of all, swim. Her near-fatal immersion hadn’t put her off water, not even the salty kind. And she hadn’t gone off Jamie either. He’d been very proper and hands-off while she’d been a patient, and Erica was looking forward to being in her own bed again, with and without him. The thought of Will Bennett intruded itself now and again. Standing there next day without a mark on him, while there she was, a wreck, who had handed over the evidence that tied up his case for him. And how did he thank her?
‘You see, Erica, I was right all along. I said it was Tessa Kingston from the start.’ While Will enjoyed being right, even if for the wrong reasons, he had to admit she had supplied much of the evidence and the major jumps forward in the investigation.
They had looked at each other, and the chemistry was still there. The feel of his strong arms and the blue of his eyes had regained their appeal. Jamie’s cuteness receded in her mind. Why couldn’t she have both of them?
Will gazed down at her. ‘Oh Erica. You’re a mathematician, you have logic, if only you’d use it. You could make a fortune doing a useful job with your brain instead of this homeopathy crap.’
If only chemistry, and biology, were enough. If only Will could lose the power of speech instead of his appeal.
Erica didn’t want to believe her empowering therapy had really helped to make Tessa the Operator; it was being the victim, storing up humiliation and pain, suddenly given the chance to be the one with power, that had triggered that, though perhaps it had been in her all along. But she was left to wonder how she, trained and experienced in understanding people and all their quirks, could have been so wrong about her patient. She was such a good judge of people.
Wasn’t she?
<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Grateful thanks are due to Ann Cleeves for invaluable advice and support at an earlier stage and for a fabulous cover quote. Thank you also to authors Alex Marwood and Chris Longmuir for pre-publication reading and reviews, to my daughter Lydia Laws for feedback and support, and to my friends of the Authors Electric blogging collective for advice on all things Amazon. Thank you also to Sheila Wakefield of Red Squirrel Press, publisher of my crime fiction and recent poetry in paperback. And finally love and thanks to Dr Allan Huggins, my long-suffering boyfriend, for computer- and image- related advice and assistance, and for listening to me ranting and despairing as well as sharing my joys.
THE OPERATOR is set on the North East coast of England, mainly in fictionalised versions of Whitley Bay and Tynemouth, and in Newcastle upon Tyne.
OTHER EBOOKS BY VALERIE LAWS
THE ROTTING SPOT (Bruce and Bennett Mystery 1)
‘A darkly intriguing debut’ Val McDermid
LYDIA BENNET’S BLOG (the real story of Pride & Prejudice)
ALL THAT LIVES (poetry of sex, death and pathology)
For Valerie’s books published in paperback see
www.valerielaws.co.uk
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
OTHER EBOOKS BY VALERIE LAWS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Valerie Laws is a Northumbrian crime and comedy novelist, poet, playwright and sci-art specialist. Her recent work, in new crime novel THE OPERATOR and la
test poetry collection ALL THAT LIVES, is informed by funded Residencies at a London Pathology Museum, at Kings College London Medical School, and at Newcastle University's Institute for Ageing and Health, researching the science of dying with neuroscientists and pathologists. Her twelve published books (four ebooks, eleven paperback) include crime fiction, poetry collections, drama, best-selling language books and comedy. She has written twelve commissioned plays for stage and BBC radio. Many prizes and awards include: Wellcome Trust Arts Award, twice prizewinner in National Poetry competition, two Northern Writers Awards. She invents new forms of kinetic poetry, devising science-themed poetry installations and commissions including world-infamous Quantum Sheep, an Arts Council-funded project spray-painting poetry onto live sheep. She featured in BBC2 TV's Why Poetry Matters with Griff Rhys Jones, with a quantum haiku on inflatable beach balls, later performed live at Royal Festival Hall London. Kinetic poetry AV installations/films such as Slicing The Brain have featured in public exhibitions across Europe and UK, and her embedded haiku Window of Art computer-controlled illuminated installation is in St Thomas Hospital London. She has had many other writers’ residencies, including in Egypt in a 5* hotel, and currently at Dilston Physic Garden in Northumberland. She performs her work live and in the media worldwide.
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN