“You okay boy?” said Harold, crouching down before him.
He was hardly listening, his eyes riveted to the shotgun that Harold had cracked and slung over one arm, the gun that had ended the madness.
Harold saw his best friend lying on the floor, his chest and head blown apart. “Jesus Christ, not you too Chris,” he whispered. The frenzy had died in his deep blue eyes and now they just looked sad and tired as they fixed on him. “Did he hurt you boy?”
Solemnly he shook his head.
“What about your mum and sister?”
Slowly he raised an arm and pointed towards the sitting room. Harold nodded at the other two to check, who skirted round the massive pool of congealing sticky blood and lumps of flesh that had once formed his father. There was a muttered oath then they both returned, shaking their heads.
“Damn,” was all Harold said. “Come on boy, let’s get you out of here.”
Harold wrapped him up in his dad’s big coat then steered him out into the night, forcing his face into his side so he wouldn’t have to look at the dead Malcolm but he fought against him, pushing him away. Just as he turned to look the lightning broke through, illuminating the corpse in all its bloody, ruined glory…
Graeme shook himself out of the past, returning to the present. The pleasure he’d got from seeing that body still disturbed him. It had been different to seeing his dead family, that had just been sad. Seeing Malcolm slain had made sense to him. Evil had come into the village and it had been eradicated. In the aftermath of the massacre the authorities had banded words about like depression and snapped. But Graeme had known different. He’d looked into those black pits in Malcolm’s face and known he was looking into pure evil and - just like Harold and his friends had done - he must join in the fight against it.
Graeme caressed the rifle in his hands. He’d used a shotgun in his first kill when he was just nineteen. He’d bided his time until he’d stopped being passed from pillar to post between old aunties and uncles who hadn’t a clue what to do with a traumatised teenager and he’d fallen off Social Services’ radar. Then he’d taken a shotgun that had belonged to the deceased husband of one of those old aunties, cleaned it and taken care of it.
He’d seen killing but he hadn’t known what it would feel like to actually take a life, so he’d followed one of the farmers into an isolated field, a grumpy old bastard who’d caused everyone around him nothing but misery. The man had been a tough sod but he was old and Graeme, though wiry, was strong and young. He’d overpowered him, jammed the shotgun into the old man’s mouth and pulled the trigger. No one had thought anything of it. Suicide had been the verdict. Everyone had quickly put the incident to the backs of their minds and moved on. It had been so ludicrously easy he couldn’t believe it. But it had made him realise that he didn’t like to use a shotgun as a weapon. At first he’d thought using the same weapon Harold and his friends had used to slay the monster in his village would be almost poetic. However every time he’d picked it up and felt the cold steel beneath his fingers he was reminded of that terrible night and the bodies of his family popped into his head with gruesome clarity, destroying his concentration and resolve. He’d discovered the rifle during his time in the army and everything had finally fallen into place. That weapon felt like an extension of himself, like a fifth limb and he’d taken to his mission with gusto.
He’d served his time in the army, gathering all the skills he needed to complete his mission. When he’d come out he was alone, having lost touch with the old uncles and aunts who had tormented him through his teenage years. This isolation was good though, it meant he was free to move from village to village, staying for a while, blending into the background, working out where the rottenness lay then eradicating it before it could spread. Often all that was needed to stop the rot were just one or two quiet little executions. That was until he’d come across the village in the north west highlands that had been almost as decayed as Blair Dubh - a paedophile teacher, a blackmailing old crone, a teenager who’d stabbed someone to death for fifty quid, the man who’d insisted on driving everywhere far too fast until he’d run over and killed a child. Scum. Useless, pathetic, wastes of space. The world was a much better place without them. But their evil had already infected others - the victims of the blackmailing crone had stooped to base behaviour to protect their dirty secrets, friends of the car driver blamed the dead child for being near a road in the first place, contacts of the paedo teacher used their influence to shield him from the consequences of his actions. They all had to go too. No one had ever linked him with the eight deaths in that village. He’d come and gone without anyone really noticing, using an alias, changing his appearance. His natural hair colour was actually a shocking red and very memorable. He’d dyed it for years, alternating between brown and blond, cutting it short and letting it grow, putting on weight and losing it again. He’d also used twelve different aliases. It was ridiculously easy to pretend to be someone else, even in the age of Big Brother, you just had to know how.
Graeme looked out over the water, the thick black clouds rolling in ever closer, occasionally lit up from the inside by flashes from the storm they struggled to contain. The sea was whipped up into a fury, throwing the boats about in dock. Summer was coming to an end so there weren’t as many moored as there would have been at high season.
It was all a sign, the wildness of nature once again guiding him. Every time he’d struck there had been a storm, just like the night his family was slaughtered, it was his cue to begin his great work. He had heard Blair Dubh was subject to frequent storms so it had amazed him that last year had passed without a single one.
A fresh clap of thunder made his heart pump hard. For a moment he was back under that kitchen table, cowering, staring into the face of evil. He gripped the rifle tighter. It was time to begin.
Soft voices were carried to him on the breeze - hushed voices, nothing more than whispers, which were full of mischief. Someone was up to something.
Scanning the area Graeme spied a couple hand-in-hand hurrying up the hill towards the graveyard. Raising his binoculars he saw they were only young, probably late teens, both attractive. He didn’t recognise them, which meant they weren’t Blair Dubh residents. They looked around furtively before ducking into the graveyard, shielded from his view by the thick stone wall that marked its boundary.
Curious, he followed, wondering what they were up to.
Keeping low, he peered over the wall and saw the man leading the woman towards Father Logan’s grave, which had once been marked by a grand headstone but was now nothing more than a slight lump in the ground. The young couple lay down on it together and frantically began kissing and tugging at each other’s clothes.
Graeme was livid. The village had attracted ghouls and thrill-seekers hoping to experience some of the Blair Dubh darkness but this was the fucking limit. They intended to copulate on hallowed ground. It was a blasphemy, evil, wrong.
As he vaulted over the wall and landed soundlessly behind a large headstone he drew the silenced pistol from his belt, the same one that had killed Adam Michie.
“Simon,” giggled Vicky as her boyfriend fumbled with the clasp of her bra. “Are you sure this is right?”
“Course it is,” he smiled down at her. “Bugger,” he whispered when he struggled to unfasten her bra because his hands were shaking with excitement. He’d dreamed of this for weeks after reading all about the activities of Father Logan. He was addicted to true crime - books, documentaries, online articles, anything he could get his hands on and his erection was urgent and painful knowing he was so close to the body of one of the serial killers he was so fascinated with. He didn’t know what was more exciting - Vicky or the grave.
“It’s creepy knowing I’m lying on top of a murderer,” she said.
“It just makes it more exciting,” he replied, burying his face in her neck, sliding his hands under the cups of her bra instead because he couldn’t remove it.
“What if someone sees us?”
“Who’s going to see us? We’re all alone up here, with the ghosts.”
“Don’t say that, it’s spooky enough.”
Slowly he unzipped her jeans and slid his hand inside her panties, silencing her protestations as she released a sigh of pleasure, her lips curling into a lazy smile. “That feels good.”
“I know. Just relax,” he whispered, kissing her mouth.
As Vicky pressed her hands to his crotch she sensed someone standing over them. Opening her eyes she released a scream that made Simon jump.
“What is it?” he said, frowning down at her.
Fear had stolen her voice. Instead she nodded at something over his shoulder and he turned and released a cry of surprise when he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
“So you want a taste of the Blair Dubh madness, do you?” said Graeme.
Both teenagers were terrified by the rage in his eyes. Simon’s potent erection deflated. Up close this wasn’t so much fun.
“We didn’t mean any harm,” he said, starting to roll off Vicky.
“Don’t move,” Graeme ordered and he went still. Beneath him Simon could feel Vicky had gone rigid with fright. When warmth seeped into his jeans he thought he’d wet himself, until he understood that it was her. Simon didn’t consider the man to be a serious threat, he thought one of the locals, pissed off with their antics, had come to give them a good scare. Well he wasn’t about to allow this idiot to make a fool of him, especially in front of Vicky. “I’m sorry if we upset you but were just having a bit of fun. We’ll go now.”
“No you fucking won’t. I said don’t move,” he barked when Simon tried rolling over again.
The stranger’s savage tone and the ferocity of his gaze finally told Simon that he wasn’t playing and something with cold bony fingers touched his spine, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. “We’ll leave now and we won’t come back.”
“You’re never leaving here,” said Graeme before pulling the trigger.
The bullet hit Simon in the back, ploughing through his heart and slamming into Vicky’s right shoulder. She cried out in pain and tried to scream but her voice was stolen as her whole body turned numb with shock.
“Don’t, please,” she whimpered, the tears starting to fall. Her sobs grew louder when the gun was aimed at her head and she knew there was nothing she could do to stop it. Simon’s dead weight was pinning her to the ground, making escape impossible. He was so heavy it was difficult for her to breathe and she had the horrible feeling she was going to sink into the grave beneath her.
Graeme’s glare was merciless. “You have desecrated holy ground. In turn, the sinner must be punished,” he said before pulling the trigger.
Her body jumped then went still, a single drop of blood oozing from the small hole in her forehead.
Graeme’s body sagged as sudden exhaustion sought to claim him. It had all happened so fast, there had hardly been time to think and the shock of it made him unaccountably sleepy. Sometimes he felt like this after an impulsive kill. It was as though the sheer speed and surprise of it all sapped his energy. But there wasn’t time for rest, he had so much work to do. The long night ahead stretched out before him, making him feel even more lethargic.
A growl of thunder overhead soon snapped him out of it. The storm was closer now, the energy crackling in the air re-energising him. He looked down at the bodies and sighed. So young. It amazed him how quickly evil could claim the innocent.
He looked around to make sure no one had seen him but the graveyard was deserted. No one came here anymore, except for the odd hardy soul like Nora Donaldson, who regularly tended to the grave of her husband as well as those of Freya’s dead parents. Not many had her courage, they all thought it was a haunted place belonging only to the dead. Toby and his tour groups were regular visitors here too but Graeme, after careful monitoring of them through his binoculars, had noted that not even they stayed long. After taking photos of the graves of Logan and Lynch and their victims they quickly hastened away as the shadows moved in, telling them with their dark presence to get out of their territory, the living weren’t welcome.
Graeme left as quietly as he’d come, leaving the bodies lying on Logan’s grave. By the time anyone found them he’d be long gone.
CHAPTER 9
The residents of the village were reluctant to leave the sanctuary of the pub. Although Adam’s body had been carted away and the police had left they felt secure remaining where they were, there was safety in numbers after all. Just one look outside into the gathering darkness, brought on prematurely by the storm that was gaining in intensity, was enough to make every one of them reject the idea of departing and just order another drink from the bar instead. Gordon wasn’t in any rush to evict them either, he was raking it in and he’d never been one to stick to the official closing hours.
They were discussing happier, more hopeful things. They’d exhausted every possible avenue about what Adam had done and now instead they remembered Fred and Joanie, sharing the good memories they had of them, the rest of the pub listening as one by one they took turns reciting treasured little anecdotes. The two tourists were slumped in a corner looking bored, realising murder up close wasn’t as entertaining as they’d thought. Everyone was shiny-faced with sweat as the humidity rose but in contrast to the storm gathering outside the atmosphere inside was calm and quiet, the voices gentle and subdued. The adrenaline and fear was draining out of everyone, soothed by the camaraderie of old friendships and the comfort of long-loved faces.
When the door banged open they all raised a cheer. Jimmy entered, his injured arm bandaged and held in a sling, followed by Lizzy and Jeanette.
“Welcome back,” said Bill, holding his hand out for Jimmy to shake.
Jimmy looked from his injured arm to Bill with a raised eyebrow and his friend lowered his hand.
“Sorry, that was a stupid thing to do.” Instead Bill clapped him on the shoulder. “Let me buy you a pint.”
“Oh no he doesn’t, he’s on painkillers,” said Lizzy. “He’ll have an orange juice.”
“If I can’t have a pint after I’ve been shot then what’s the world coming to?” frowned Jimmy.
“Fine, drink your pint if you want to make yourself ill,” she huffed, folding her arms across her large bosom.
Jimmy gave Gordon a hangdog look. “I’ll have an orange juice.”
“I’ve got some alcohol-free lager if you want?” said Gordon. “I was reliably informed by the big Jessie who tried one that it tastes just like lager.”
Jimmy’s expression hardened. “Orange juice will be fine.”
“I’ll have a sherry,” said Lizzy cheerfully, earning herself a glare from her husband.
“Where’s Betty?” said Iza.
“Still in hospital,” replied Jeanette. “She had a heart attack so they’re keeping her in. She’s in a bad way.” Her tone intimated that Betty might not leave hospital alive and their joy at Jimmy’s safe return was dampened.
“Adam was all she had left,” said Nora. “Now he’s gone…” She trailed off and looked down at her hands. Craig, sat beside her, gently patted her shoulder.
Furnished with his unwanted drink, Jimmy held court as he related his version of events, skimming over the part where he was sick on seeing the McNab’s bodies and heaping praise on an embarrassed Craig.
When that fresh topic of conversation had been exhausted Ted and Iza, an elderly couple that had lived in the village for over forty years, decided it was time to leave.
“Stay for another drink,” urged Jeannette.
“We can’t I’m afraid, Ted needs his blood pressure medication,” Iza announced. “And I need my bed.”
“I won’t sleep tonight,” said Jeanette.
“I’m going to take a couple of my pills, they’ll knock me right out,” smiled Iza.
“You’re welcome to stay longer,” Gordon announced to the room.
“If
we don’t go now then we’ll never leave,” called back Iza, pulling on her coat, buttoning herself up against the storm. “I want to get home before the weather gets worse. Night all.”
“Night,” the pub called back to the pair of them as Iza took her husband’s arm and they exited the pub into the darkness.
This was the cue for the exodus to begin of the older residents who’d been exhausted by the day’s events. Slowly they began to gather up their things, taking their time about it, reluctant to go out into the storm and leave the cosy security of the pub.
“Do you want to go Mum? I can walk you back,” offered Craig.
“I need another drink first. Gordon, fill me up,” said Nora, gesturing to her glass.
“Don’t you think you’ve had enough?” said Craig.
“I am your mother young man.”
“How could I ever forget?” he smiled, amused when she slurred her words.
“I’m old enough to know when I’ve had enough. Anyway I’m not on whisky, I’ve switched to wine.”
Craig considered telling her mixing her drinks would only get her drunk quicker but decided it would be best for their relationship - which was just getting back on track - if he kept his thoughts to himself, so he just let her get on with it.
Graeme watched the front of the pub from the side of Nora’s cottage. Unfortunately the curtains were shut, a habit of Gordon’s, but that didn’t matter, it wouldn’t be enough to protect them.
The adrenaline started pumping when the pub door opened and light flooded the darkened street. The storm was still rumbling on around him but he’d acclimatised to it and got the memories under control. They were once again safely locked away in a dark corner of his mind and he was in complete control of himself.
He raised the rifle, watching the two figures slowly wending their way down the road towards him, not a clue what was waiting for them in the dark. He smiled. This was going to be too easy.
Electric Light (Blair Dubh Trilogy #3) Page 7