Then She Was Gone

by Luca Veste

  ‘You don’t know a thing about my life. About my work.’

  ‘I know enough,’ Rossi said, looking towards Murphy for the first time and taking a step closer. He matched her step, seeing her intentions in her eyes.

  ‘You think you can comprehend anything? Just because they give you a suit doesn’t mean a thing.’

  ‘Because I’m a woman, is that it?’ Rossi said, taking another step and removing her hands from her pocket. ‘That’s not going to fly here, Simon.’

  ‘No, but I will if you keep moving towards me.’

  Murphy stopped moving, now only just out of reaching distance of Jackson. Rossi took another step, before she too came to a stop.

  ‘We need to talk this all through,’ Murphy said, glancing towards Rossi and motioning with his head. ‘Make sense of it all.’

  ‘What does it matter?’ Jackson said, turning around fully now. The back of his shoes were over the edge, only one movement from falling down to the pavement. ‘It’s done, there’s nothing left to do now.’

  ‘Tim will be released soon,’ Rossi said, facing Jackson and holding his gaze. ‘He didn’t kill anyone. Soon, he’ll be out on the streets, with nothing to answer for. Are you telling me you don’t want to be the one to make sure he goes back inside?’

  ‘You’re lying,’ Jackson said, but Murphy could see the hesitation on his face. ‘He’s never getting out.’

  ‘Yes, he is,’ Rossi replied, her voice rising above the noise below them. ‘He was one of them, wasn’t he?’

  ‘She shouldn’t have been there,’ Jackson said, tears springing to his eyes as his feet wavered on the edge of the rooftop. ‘None of this would have happened if she’d just stayed away.’

  Murphy bit back a reply, hoping Rossi would do the same.

  ‘They did to her what you all had been doing for years. To other people’s sisters and daughters.’

  ‘She wasn’t like them,’ Jackson said, anger on his face now, turning redder by the second. ‘She was a good girl. They took advantage . . .’

  Rossi moved towards him. ‘You’re not going to jump off here and escape it all, Simon. You can’t run away from this. You’re going to face up to what you’ve done, make sure Tim Johnson doesn’t get away with what he did. That’s what you’re going to do.’

  Jackson wiped a sleeve across his face, looking at Murphy for a second before turning his attention back to Rossi. ‘She never listened to me,’ he said, a wry smile creeping across his face. ‘She just wanted to be a part of whatever I was doing. She was always like that. When Vincenzo turned up at my office, I didn’t know what to say. I knew, though, before then. I knew what had happened.’

  ‘You just needed to hear it being said by someone else.’

  ‘She never told me. She came here, for one weekend. I didn’t want her at the party. I knew what they were like. Sam, Tim . . . they were the worst. They liked them young and Ellie was only seventeen. Looked even younger. I tried to keep an eye on her, but she left with them. I didn’t know that, though. She sent me a message saying she’d gone back to my flat. I didn’t even check to see if she was in bed or anything. She’d gone back home by the time I woke up the next morning.’

  ‘When did she die?’

  Jackson shook his head, Murphy watching the exchange without speaking. He inched a little closer, hoping Jackson wouldn’t notice.

  ‘A few months later,’ Jackson said, looking up towards the sky. Murphy held his breath as he waited for him to topple backwards.

  ‘They never said anything to you?’

  Jackson shook his head. ‘They would make jokes, before she died. That’s all I thought they were – jokes. Banter and that. I didn’t think it was actually true.’

  ‘Vincenzo told you, though, didn’t he? He told you what they did to her.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jackson replied, his head falling onto his chest, eyes closing. ‘I called him a liar. Told him to keep his mouth shut, otherwise he would destroy everything. It wasn’t the way things should be done. She shouldn’t have been there.’

  ‘You can’t run away from this any more, Simon,’ Rossi said, a couple of steps away from him now. Murphy was almost as close. Within a step or two, they would be almost on him. ‘It’s over.’

  Jackson lifted his head, looking first at Rossi, then Murphy. He looked up towards the sky again.

  ‘Think of your family,’ Murphy said, trying to stop the inevitable. ‘Are you just going to leave them to pick up the pieces?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. They’ll get by a lot better without me. I failed her,’ Jackson said, lifting his arms into the air again, outstretched as if he was on an invisible cross. ‘But I made it up to her. It’s over all right. They’ll never do it again.’

  When people spoke to Murphy about these kinds of situations, they always said time slowed down. They said everything stopped and they could see everything happen in slow motion.

  It didn’t happen that way for him.

  One second, he was reaching out towards Simon Jackson, Rossi by his side matching his movements.

  The next, he was grabbing at thin air, hearing the screams from down below.

  You

  It doesn’t matter what they say. They can never change your mind. You knew how this ended, before you even began. You knew all those years earlier, when you lowered Ellie Jackson into her early grave. The look of pain and agony on your parents’ faces as they buried their daughter. You knew then, there was only one way to make up for all that you had caused.

  You look at both of those strangers on the rooftop, one to the other, then lift your arms out. You hope to be welcomed home, to see her again.

  To say you’re sorry. To beg for forgiveness. For everything you did.

  There’s a second when your feet try to find purchase, then all you can feel is the wind rushing around you. You close your eyes to it all. You embrace the darkness as you fall, down and down.

  You hope that the trip down ends there. That you don’t keep falling afterwards. That you’ll make your way back up. That you won’t go to hell.

  The last thing you think of before you hit the ground is her.

  Ellie. Your sister. The one you allowed to die. She killed herself, because she couldn’t live any more.

  Please forgive me.

  Epilogue

  It hadn’t taken much to get Vincenzo Rossi to talk. He knew he was in deep trouble and that his sister wasn’t going to be able to help him unless he revealed all he knew.

  His information had led them to where they were now. Standing outside the anonymous door of an apartment near Sefton Park. Close to the place where Tim Johnson had lost what he thought was his daughter.

  ‘Let them go in first,’ Murphy said to Rossi. ‘Clear the place just in case.’

  He still wasn’t sure she should be there with him, but he knew there was going to be no talking her out of it. She wanted to be there at the end, to make sure everything was done right, in case it meant even further trouble for her brother.

  ‘Police, open the door.’

  Murphy stood further back from the other uniformed officers, waiting for the door to open.

  Tim Johnson was going to be released, based on Vincenzo Rossi’s statement, he thought. They were currently in the process of tracking down the Polish woman he had supposedly murdered. It wouldn’t take long, not with the information Vincenzo had provided.

  Murphy had agreed to Rossi’s request in exchange for all of this. Her brother’s name would be kept out of it all. It was a risk, given that Hazel or her eventual lawyer might use that in her defence, but they could plead ignorance.

  It would take time for them to get back to normal, but Murphy knew it would happen. There was just too much between them for it not to.

  ‘We’re going in.’

  Murphy watched as they broke down the apartment door and quickly entered one after another. He was pretty sure they would find nothing in there.

  Hazel Jones would be gone.
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br />   ‘What do you think will happen to them?’

  Murphy turned back to Rossi, trying to figure out an answer to her question. He knew who she meant. ‘I think the Abercromby Club will struggle to come back from this.’

  The burnt body of James Morley, the final name on Simon Jackson’s list before his own, had been returned to his family down south. With the exception of Tim Johnson, all the founding members of the club were now no more.

  Already, women were coming forward with stories of the club’s practices over the years. Tim may be released for a murder he didn’t commit, but he wasn’t going to be free for very long. There would be a number of prosecutions over the coming months and years.

  ‘Tim Johnson won’t get away with it, you know,’ Murphy said, looking down at Rossi as she absent-mindedly chewed on a fingernail. ‘He’ll be going down for a long time.’

  ‘Won’t be enough, though, will it? It’s not really justice for what he did.’

  ‘And what Simon Jackson did was?’

  Rossi waited a moment, then shrugged her shoulders. ‘I suppose we can’t put people in prison for being the reason someone kills themselves. We’d have to create a whole bunch of new laws for that to happen.’

  ‘We won’t tell him,’ Murphy said, having found the moment he had been waiting for.

  ‘Tell him what?’

  ‘That the baby isn’t his,’ Murphy replied, peering over the heads of the officers in the hallway and seeing a shake of the head from those at the head of the pack. ‘He can live his life thinking she’s out there and he’ll never know the truth.’

  ‘Dangerous, don’t you think?’

  ‘In what way?’

  Rossi leaned back against the wall behind her and looked up at Murphy. ‘He will try to find her.’

  ‘First, he’ll be in prison for a long time. I have no doubt about that. Second, let him try and find a needle in a haystack. He has no idea what country that woman he lived with for months even went to. And we’re not going to tell him. All we need from her is proof she is alive. After that, she can disappear again.’

  Rossi thought for a second, then slowly nodded towards Murphy.

  He hoped it was enough.

  Once they had left the university, shepherded off the roof of the Old Vic and down the stairs by the firemen who had arrived behind them, Murphy heard the full story. How Hazel Jones had put her plan into place, how Vincenzo Rossi had helped her get Irena Dubicki’s daughter back to her mother. The money he had helped contribute to buy her silence. How he had aided Hazel Jones as she created a convincing crime scene.

  The whole sorry tale of revenge, which had run alongside Simon Jackson’s story of vengeance.

  They filled in the gaps later. Vincenzo Rossi going to see Simon Jackson when Tim Johnson had been arrested for murder, and the part that had played in causing Jackson to seek his own revenge for what had happened to his sister. Jackson’s need to atone for the failure to keep his sister safe from the sordid life he had created. It had driven him to end the toxic environment he had helped to create. An environment in which women were objects, things to conquer, whatever the outcome.

  To kill those he blamed for her death. Including himself.

  ‘They didn’t care before,’ Rossi said, back at the station that day. ‘None of them did. Those women weren’t like the ones they knew in their family. If what happened to Simon Jackson’s sister had happened to any of their close family members, they might have reacted similarly to him. They were sexual psychopaths. All of them.’

  Murphy hadn’t disagreed with her. There was too much evidence coming out about the club and its activities to do so. How they created a culture at the university surrounding their activities which promoted silence and the goal of ultimate power.

  Well, it would be over for that club now, Murphy thought. All it takes is a single event and a whole organisation can be brought down. Sarah had told him the atmosphere at the university was significantly different now. Everyone was falling over themselves to condemn and castigate those with any attachment to the club.

  Murphy wondered if the condemnation would be matched at other universities in the country, many of which had groups of young men all doing similar things to what the Abercromby Boys Club had done.

  He wondered if anything ever really changes.

  ‘She’s not here, sir,’ a uniform said, joining them in the hallway. ‘Evidence that she’s been here recently, but there’s milk on the side which has turned, so she’s been gone a couple of days at least, I reckon. Left in a hurry.’

  ‘I bet she did,’ Murphy said, making his way towards the apartment, leaving Rossi where she was standing.

  He was glad Hazel Jones had gone.

  He hoped that she would never return.

  That she would be happy, wherever she was.

  Let There Be Light

  The internet was slow, but eventually the Daily Mail website appeared. She read the main story, scrolling down and studying every word on the page. She went back to the beginning, reading it all over again. The details were slim, but there was enough information for her to take on board and digest what had happened. The sidebar of shame tried to take her attention, but she ignored it.

  Simon Jackson was dead. Along with all the others. All of them, except one.

  Tim Johnson remained in prison. She didn’t know how long that would last, but it mattered little to her now. She had already taken what she needed from him.

  She clicked onto another tab and read the message from Vincenzo again. The story they had created, which had put Tim where he belonged, was over. Soon, he would be free, but Vincenzo promised it wouldn’t be for long. That he would be made to answer for everything that Boys Club had done over the years of his membership. Brave women coming forward and telling their own story. The truth.

  There was more though. He would never know the truth about the little girl he called Molly. Vincenzo knew for sure.

  He would never see the little girl he thought was his daughter again. And he would never know she wasn’t his. She was gone, along with the baby’s mother. Back to Eastern Europe, a little wealthier, a little more confused about life. She would come forward and say she wasn’t dead, but that would be it. The money had been enough to buy her silence on that. The promise of more on the little girl’s eighteenth birthday was the final nail in that particular coffin.

  Tim Johnson would spend the rest of his pitiful life searching for a daughter who didn’t exist. That was enough payback for her. First, she had taken his freedom, now she would sit back and enjoy the thought of taking his soul. He would forever be in the thrall of the lie she had created.

  She enjoyed the thought of that.

  She signed out of the computer, paid up for the time she had used, then left the internet cafe. She shifted the backpack, enjoying the weight of it on her back. She adjusted the cap on her head, running a hand through the short hair, trying to get used to it. It would probably take a little longer, but it was necessary. She had to be careful now. She wasn’t expecting a womanhunt, but it paid to be careful.

  The sun was high up in the sky as midday clicked past. She started walking, not sure of a destination yet. Just happy to have the choice to do so.

  She remembered Vincenzo telling her about visiting Simon Jackson at his office the previous year. Telling him exactly what his friends had done, what they had caused. She had enjoyed that.

  She had told him to visit him. She had enjoyed that feeling of power, of control. She was in charge. It had been a long time, but she finally had command of a situation.

  She hadn’t known what Simon Jackson would do with the information. She wasn’t sure if she cared. Reading what he had been doing didn’t make her feel responsible, or party to his actions.

  She felt nothing.

  It was another world to her now. A story with a beginning, a middle and an end. Another life. Not hers any more. They weren’t around any more, but she didn’t care.

 
She was moving past them. They were left behind her. They wouldn’t trouble her any more. The nightmares would come to an end.

  She hoped.

  There was light in her life at last. An end to the darkness which had enveloped her. She would never forget, but she could at least live her life without looking back.

  It was over.

  A new chapter could begin. A new story could be told.

  She allowed herself one last thought about the men who had taken that part of her away. The eight names, the eight men. They might not have all been physically guilty of what had occurred to her that night, but they all shared the blame equally in her eyes.

  She wasn’t sure. She could never have been, that was something she would have to live with.

  She was only certain of one man’s guilt.

  Tim Johnson.

  He deserved everything she had inflicted upon him. He deserved the harrowing life he would lead now.

  That was her revenge.

  She looked left and right, crossing the busy road alongside a few other people. She tuned back into the surrounding noise. The blaring of horns and shouts from the various drivers. A foreign land, a place that would soon become a footnote on her travels.

  She continued walking, head held up high, looking forwards and not back.

  Hazel lost herself in the crowd and became just like anyone else there.

  Free of her past. Only looking to the future.

  There was one last moment, when she closed her eyes and felt her fears drift away.

  Then, she was gone.

  Acknowledgements

  Some things never change. This book may have my name on the cover, but it takes a bunch of good people to make sure it reaches your hands. Here are some names, which may not be recognisable to you, but who all contributed to the journey of publication.

  Firstly, my small band of grouchy, embittered, hilarious, and warm-hearted fellow writers: Eva Dolan, Jay Stringer, and Nick Quantrill. Our continuous chats keep me on the straight and narrow. I have made friends for life in you three. Similarly, Craig Robertson, for being as much of a bastard as I am. You’re stuck with me mate. England Crime Writers will beat your Scottish lot one day.