The Principle of Evil: A Fast-Paced Serial Killer Thriller (DCI Claire Winters, Book 2)

by T. M. E. Walsh

  Olivia’s right fist balled up at her side. She swung it towards his face but he blocked the punch. Undeterred, she launched herself at him, her hands grabbing at his shirt, knees crashing over the table top.

  ‘Don’t you judge me!’

  Elias got behind her, trying to haul her back.

  ‘Where’s he taken them?’ Stefan demanded. He grabbed her hands when her fingers clawed at the fabric of his shirt, tearing into his skin.

  She then dropped to the floor as if the life had been instantly sucked out of her. She started crying, tears streaming down her face. Both men looked shell-shocked.

  Then Stefan’s mobile rang.

  DC Cleaver.

  ‘Jane?’ he said, answering it.

  ‘Starling Rentals in Letchworth,’ she said. ‘I found part of the invoice. He’s rented a van but he’s burnt the paperwork. I’ve managed to piece together some of the remaining fragments but we don’t know the make or model of the vehicle.’

  When Jane had finished, Stefan hung up. His face was flushed, but a sense of relief spread across his face. ‘Get her back in a cell,’ he said.

  Olivia looked up at him.

  ‘You going to tell us where that van’s going?’ He saw the flicker of recognition in her eyes. He crouched down, staring into her face. ‘Last chance.’

  She leaned forward and spat in his face. ‘Go to hell.’

  CHAPTER 89

  Stefan and Elias drew worried looks from the admin staff as they showed their warrant cards to the manager, Elliot Starling, of Starling Rentals. He frowned at both men, reluctantly ushering them through to his office. He offered them a seat, but they declined. Elliot flopped down in the chair behind his desk, his face stern as they explained that Lucas was a person of interest. They were careful not to mention anything else.

  ‘He used his real name,’ Elliot said, running his finger across the entry in his log book. ‘Hired a short-wheelbase Ford Transit van, white. Paid in cash. He came in yesterday and knew exactly which van he wanted.’ Stefan frowned and Elliot’s face grew serious. ‘What’s he wanted for?’

  Stefan explained.

  Elliot felt sick. He sat back down in his chair again. ‘This isn’t a joke, is it?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘Christ. Why didn’t you say so? Look,’ he said, now reaching for the keyboard on his desk, ‘we have tracking devices in all our vehicles.’ He pulled up a software application and typed in a few details relating to the van Lucas had hired.

  After a few seconds he smiled, turning the computer monitor around. ‘There you go.’

  Leaning forward, Stefan and Elias saw a map, similar to those on Google, with a blue dot on the screen about fifty miles north-west from where they were sitting.

  CHAPTER 90

  Claire awoke to the sound of the wind howling. She felt the cold air gnawing at the skin of her bare arms. Her clothes were still sodden, sticking to her like a second skin. She shivered involuntarily. She opened her eyes a little more but saw nothing much in the shadows. There was only one shaft of daylight, which crept through a single boarded-up window.

  The last thing she remembered was seeing Lucas and the white rag he’d held over her face.

  Then she remembered Fallon.

  She pulled her body upright. She was still bound at the wrists but with a thick white cord, which numbed her wrists. She tried to flex her wrists out. The cord wouldn’t break but gave enough to allow sensation to flow through her fingers again.

  She looked around the room. She made out the outline of a door opposite and a long shape on the floor not far from her feet.

  ‘Fallon?’

  There was a murmur and the shape rolled over. ‘Fallon, is that you? You need to wake up.’

  The figure rolled to face her. Claire could just about make out the outline of her face.

  ‘You should’ve let me sleep. I just want this to be over.’

  ‘We need to find a way out of here. Can you crawl to me?’

  Fallon sneered. ‘And what do you plan to do if we get our hands untied and manage to get out of this fucking shack? We’re in the middle of bloody nowhere.’ She rolled over to face the floor, her back towards Claire.

  ‘You know where we are? I thought Lucas knocked us both out.’

  ‘He did, but I woke up as he was moving us from his van. We’re in some kind of wood or forest, nothing but trees around this derelict shack. He covered my face once he saw I was awake.’

  Fallon stopped and thought for a moment. She turned her face back to Claire’s. ‘Nobody’s going hear us scream when the time comes, are they?’

  Claire stopped pulling the cord at her wrists, slowly raising her eyes to Fallon’s. The thought made her blood run cold. Despite the darkness, she still saw the fear in the girl’s eyes.

  ‘We’re not done yet, but you need to help me. You need to think if you want to survive this. What else can you tell me about where we are?’ Fallon pulled her body up until she was sitting opposite Claire.

  ‘I’ve told you already, we’re surrounded by trees. I only caught a glimpse of this building. I don’t know how many other rooms there are.’ She sniffed, her nose now blocked where she’d been crying.

  Claire looked towards the window and saw it was covered with wooden board, crudely nailed into a rotting frame. She saw the small gap at the bottom, which let a small shaft of light into the room.

  Pulling her legs under her body, she got to her feet, stumbled towards the door ahead of them and tried the handle.

  Locked, as expected.

  She went back to the window and ran her fingers around the rough board. The wood was damp, splinters of it coming away under her touch. It would prove a little difficult to manoeuvre with her wrists bound, but if she could force her fingers up under the gap at the bottom, she might be able to pull the board away from the window frame.

  She began working her fingers into the gap, sliding them up. She winced when the flesh on her knuckles tore, scraping on the frame just beneath where the wood panel ended. When she had enough leverage, she gripped the board and pulled with force.

  The wood groaned as it started to give, and after a few minutes of pulling, a nail popped from the bottom. The other nails quickly followed, and the board soon came away in her hands and she threw it to the floor. Light from the window flooded into the room.

  From the floor, Fallon raised her bound hands to shield her eyes. When her pupils adjusted to the light, she watched Claire looking out at their surroundings.

  ‘That window’s too small for you to get through. You’ve cut your hands up for nothing.’

  Claire looked down at her hands; they were smeared with thin trickles of blood, drying on the knuckles, and her fingertips were red raw. She brushed splinters from her fingers, and turned to Fallon.

  ‘I might be, but you’re not.’

  ‘I’m not going through that window. He could be out there waiting.’

  ‘His van’s gone. I can see the tyre tracks in the snow leading along the dirt track between the trees.’

  ‘So where’s he gone?’

  Claire shrugged. ‘I don’t know but this may be our only chance to make a break for it. If we can get you through the window, you can go around to the front door and unlock the one to this room.’

  ‘And what about getting this cord off our wrists? We won’t be getting far like this.’ Claire looked down at her wrists, then around the room. Fallon glanced at her. ‘Didn’t think about that, did you?’

  Claire took in their surroundings: rough concrete floor, dark dank wooden walls, like a garden shed, pitched wooden roof, one door, and one window. Nothing she could use to cut their bonds.

  Shit.

  She returned to the window and looked outside again, cocking her head left then right, gauging the size of the shack. It couldn’t be very big. Maybe there was a kitchen where she might find a knife. Her breath steamed up the window, and it was then that she remembered just how cold it was o
utside.

  She glanced down at her clothes, still wet. They smelled musty and clung to her every curve. She realised they wouldn’t get far in the snow if they were in the middle of nowhere. She looked at Fallon and the thin jacket Lucas had made her change into before Claire was brought to his basement. It was barely giving any warmth.

  Fallon glared when she caught her staring. ‘What?’

  ‘We need to break that window.’

  ‘So break it.’

  ‘You’ve got protection in that jacket. My arms are bare. I need you to get up and use your elbow to put through the glass.’

  Fallon looked at her jacket, then the window. She shook her head. ‘Nah, you smash it. I’ll give you my jacket.’

  ‘How you going to get the sleeves over your bound wrists?’

  There was a brief silence.

  ‘I could cut myself.’

  Claire lost her patience. ‘It’s either that or the alternative. You know what Lucas is capable of.’ Fallon looked at the floor. ‘Question is, are you ready to die yet? ’Cos that’s all he has planned for us. Torture, then death. Make your choice.’

  Fallon scowled.

  ‘He could be back at any moment. If I’m going to die, I’d rather it be trying to escape.’

  It wasn’t until she heard the words escape her own lips that it really hit Claire. Hit her hard in the pit of her stomach. She was likely to die out here.

  End of the line.

  Fallon seemed to shake off her self-pity and heaved herself up onto her feet.

  Claire nodded and pointed to the window.

  ‘Once you’re outside, head around to the left. I think that part of the building that juts out is the entrance. We need to get this door open. Now,’ she said, pausing, looking at Fallon, ‘short hard jab with your elbow, here.’ She tapped the middle of the glass. She caught Fallon unconsciously rubbing her elbow. ‘It’ll be OK. You can do this. The glass is old and thin. It won’t take much to put it through.’

  Taking a few long deep breaths, psyching herself up, Fallon raised her right arm, turned her head away, gritted her teeth and lashed out, her elbow crashing hard into the glass. Claire winced at the cry that escaped Fallon’s lips as the window gave way, sending large shards of glass cascading out onto the snow outside.

  She saw the streaks of red left on the broken glass shards still wedged into the wooden frame.

  Fallon’s breathing was coming in short sharp bursts as she stared at her elbow, still raised in the void where the glass had been moments before.

  Claire pulled at her arm and looked down at the dark stain that had seeped into Fallon’s green jacket, making the blood appear black. The fabric had torn and a long fragment of glass was embedded in her skin about an inch down from her elbow. Claire touched it and Fallon flinched, yanking her arm from her grasp.

  ‘That hurts, you fucking sadist!’

  ‘I was trying to see how deep it was. Here, give me your arm, I can pull that out.’ Fallon backed off when Claire went to touch her again.

  ‘No.’ Fallon paused. ‘I’ll do it myself.’ She raised her elbow at an angle, and managed to slowly pull the glass shard from her skin, using the middle and index finger of her left hand. She winced at the pain, cramp shooting through her hand, until the glass slid out and dropped to the floor. She inspected her wound, which she quickly deduced wasn’t life threatening.

  Claire knocked the few remaining shards of glass from the window frame. The icy cold air rushed at her face, causing her breath to catch in her throat.

  Fallon stooped on tiptoes and peered out the window. She raised her bound hands, her fingers gripping the window frame, and pulled herself up further.

  She looked down at the ground. The snow looked thick and the drop was about four and a half feet from the window.

  ‘I’m going to need a bunk-up,’ she said.

  Claire cupped her hands as best she could, the cord cutting deep into her flesh, lowered her arms and braced herself. Fallon wedged her foot into Claire’s palms, gripped the window frame and, ignoring the pain in her arm, hauled herself up until she was hanging out of the window. She misjudged her balance and fell forward, landing head first in the thick snow below.

  She swore, pulling herself upright, the cold drawing deep into her jeans. It made her shiver. She looked up and saw Claire’s head poking out through the window.

  ‘Try the entrance, see if it’s unlocked. See if you can find something to cut the cord with and some blankets or warm clothes.’

  Fallon ran towards the far end of the building. Inside, Claire ran up to the door to listen out for her.

  Fallon found the entrance. The door was literally rotting away, the wood old and weathered. The building, shack-like in appearance, seemed to be a mixture of old and new. Patches of different decades sewn together.

  She gingerly approached the door and tried the handle. To her surprise it opened after she gave it a sharp jolt. She tapped the door open farther with her fingers and, with caution, peered inside.

  Satisfied the room beyond was empty, she went inside, closing the door behind her. The air was thick with the smell of damp and she quickly went into the next room, which had a small dirty-looking sink, a wall-mounted cabinet and a small table with old newspapers on top. The papers were dated five years ago, she noticed on closer inspection.

  She looked inside the cabinet on the wall, which contained a few dirty plates. She looked behind her. She saw there were two more doors ahead of her. Claire called to her from behind one of them.

  ‘Anything?’

  ‘Just a minute, there’s another door, another room next to yours.’

  Fallon edged closer and tried the handle. The door bounced open and inside was a cabinet next to an old iron-framed bed. There was a brown blanket, covered in mould, thrown over the top of a dirty mattress. Off to one side was another door within the room, which was a W.C. The toilet, Fallon noticed, was filthy, and the hand basin wasn’t much better. She didn’t linger.

  She went to the door where Claire was waiting behind it. ‘There’s nothing here,’ she said.

  ‘Nothing to cut the cord or warm clothes? There can’t seriously be nothing.’

  ‘Look, I’m telling you there’s nothing.’

  From inside the room, Claire swore to herself, looked around the room again, despite knowing it was pointless, then stared at the door in front of her. She remembered Lucas breaking into her bathroom.

  ‘Stand back,’ she shouted. ‘I’m going to try forcing the door.’

  CHAPTER 91

  Stefan stared at the dot pulsating on the screen. ‘He’s in Buckinghamshire?’

  ‘In a wood?’ Elias added.

  Elliot took another look at the screen and nodded. ‘He’s moving through Black Hill Forest by the looks of it, which is strange.’

  Elias’s eyes narrowed at the screen. ‘I’ve not heard of Black… Forest, or whatever it’s called.’

  Elliot looked at Elias with a wry smile on his lips. ‘Black Hill Forest. It’s big but as far as I know, there’s no access to the public, which is why I said it’s strange.’

  ‘But there’s vehicle access through there?’ Stefan asked, leaning across for a better angle on the screen.

  Elliot shook his head. ‘Not as such. It’s all dirt tracks… Look, I’ve not been there for eight years, easily.’ Stefan went around to Elliot’s side of the desk, taking over his computer.

  He accessed Google and searched for Black Hill Forest. There was no official website for it, or much else for that matter, but he did find a small section on an online encyclopaedia with a few details.

  ‘It’s closed to the public. It used to be open, but there isn’t much information other than that, and it doesn’t mention why it closed. Just goes on to say there’s a lake at the far end of it.’ He trailed off, read a few more lines. ‘There’s an old map still available to download.’

  Elias was now hovering at his shoulder while Stefan downloaded the PDF file. Aft
er a few tense seconds, it opened.

  The image had been scanned from an original drawing and colour-coded with pencil. It showed the lake, and a mile to the south of it, there was a small building, labelled as a Warden Station, with a first-aid logo beside it. There were a few small walking trails, but not a lot else.

  Stefan printed the map and studied it carefully.

  ‘How far is the forest from here, according to the tracking system?’

  Elliot ran his hand over his chin, while the other clicked away at the mouse, opening and closing a few files. ‘Approximately fifty miles. The van seems to be moving deeper into the forest.’

  Elias shook his head, looking at Stefan. ‘If he has Claire and Fallon in that van–’

  ‘We don’t have much time. I know,’ Stefan said, finishing his sentence. His mind drifted, and pictured Claire’s face. Just as quickly, he saw the soulless expressions of the three murdered women. Claire could easily become the next victim. Another face, another name, another bloody statistic.

  He made a decision.

  ‘We need air support.’

  ‘You won’t be able to land down there,’ Elliot said. ‘There are too many trees.’ Stefan held up the map of the forest.

  ‘There’s a clearing by the lake, and another by the Warden Station. We’ve got to take the chance. Just the sight of the helicopter might be enough to frighten Lucas into submission.’ He turned to Elias. ‘Contact the station. Put out an alert on the van Lucas is driving, in case he moves.’

  Elias blinked hard. ‘And where are you going?’

  ‘Where we’re going… RAF Benson.’

  CHAPTER 92

  It hadn’t taken Claire long to force the old door, but the cold was starting to take its toll on her body. She was hungry, thirsty and tired. Her head pounded and her body felt like it could quite easily shut down at any moment; she was running on nothing but her instinct to survive and pure fear. Fear of either dying by Lucas’s hands or by Mother Nature’s relentless winter cold.