Spiritwalker

by Siobhan Corcoran

  As he entered his flat he began to relax, he steadied his breathing. He went to the drinks cabinet and poured himself a large Jameson. He threw it back in one gulp and sat down on the swivel chair by the desk. He could feel himself getting worked up again as he reflected on the morning's events, and he reached into the desk drawer and took out a strip of pills and popped two small Valium into his mouth. He took slow measured breaths as he waited for the tablets to do their job. He hated taking them but they were the only things short of taking hard drugs that worked for him. In the past he had dabbled with drugs but he hadn't liked the feeling of not being in control that he got from them. Cocaine was his drug of choice, it made him feel on top of the world, but the feeling didn’t last long; he was always fell back down to earth with a bang. He only took it now when he need that extra something to energise him; when he had to do something he didn't want to do. If he had to host a party he had a line or two before and maybe one during: he needed it just to get him through the evening.. Everyone did it, he reassured himself each time he snorted the potent white power. He knew he had begun to take it more and more frequently recently. He fooled himself by denying that he wasn’t hooked on it.

  He began to feel calm again, in control. He was able to think rationally. Everything was going wrong lately. His charmed live seemed to be unravelling around him. All he wanted, he reflected was a happy family. A loving wife and a daughter. What was so wrong with that, he wondered. Was he not entitled to feel happiness like everyone else? He remembered his first wife Sarah, she had been beautiful. A goddess. It was hard to believe she had been dead for five years now. He remembered that terrible night that she had died. She had called to their house. The house she had once shared with him, she had demanded to come in and collect her things. That night she had told him coldly that she was remarrying again. Mocking him, daring him to react. Forbidding him from having any contact with Katie. Taunting him that her new husband was going to be Katie's father, that he was only ever a substitute for her real father. Telling him that he was just a stooge to pay the bills until someone better came along. Something inside him flipped that night. An anger so fierce, he hadn’t felt so much anger since he was a child. He stole out to her car while she was gathering her things and opened the bonnet and cut the brake lines, but only half way through. She had gotten home safely that night but the following night she had been taking Katie to her dance class and she had crashed headlong into the side of an oncoming bus. Sarah had died instantly, but Kate, poor Katie had been flung out of the car, she was in a coma for a long time. The car along with Sarah had been engulfed in flames, erasing any traces of what he had done. He had been granted custody of Katie after her Mother's death. It made him laugh when he thought of the day he got full custody, it was only when Sarah's family needed someone to foot her medical bills that they had stood aside and allowed him to have her. He wasn't her biological father. No one knew who her real father had been. He had a large insurance policy taken out on both of them, Sarah hadn't changed her will so he got everything. The thought that he had finally got one over on his wife made it all the sweeter. Every time he went to visit Katie, usually once a week and always on the anniversary of the accident, he felt nothing, she was just a lump of flesh lying there. She wasn't in a coma any longer but she wasn't able to do anything for herself, she had to be washed and dressed and fed. A useless lump of flesh that was how he had come to think of her. He wondered what she would say if she could talk. If she could communicate, the things she could tell. He loved relating to her what he had done to her mother and those other women he had hoped would take her mother's place. He felt unburdened telling her, like a sinner confessing to a priest. Once or twice he had thought he had seen a tear run down her cheek as he related his stories to her. Doctors had assured him that it was very unlikely that she understood anything he said to her. He wasn't so sure, it made him feel better to think that she could understand. He even fancied that the tears were for him that she was sorry for all the pain in his life. What the doctors didn’t know was that he liked having Katie in a vegetative state and he injected her weekly with a drug that paralysed her muscles; he had been injecting her for almost four years now and no one suspected. What made him laugh was how stupid doctors could be.

  The old grandfather clock chimed and brought him back to earth. He looked at his watch, it was nearly six O clock; he had to get back to Jane. It had been nearly twenty four hours since he had been home. Suddenly the urgency to get back was overwhelming and he hurried out, locking the door behind him. He went to the garage he rented, here he kept a car to use when he came to London. He drove quickly away, weaving through the London traffic, a sudden urgency had enveloped him. He had to get back to Jane. He reached home and waited impatiently for the automatic gates to open, as soon as he had enough space he drove in wheels spinning on the drive. He braked to a halt and dashed to the front door fumbling in his pockets for the keys...shit he thought as he rummaged through. They weren't there. Where the hell were they? What if they had fallen out of his pocket at Sylvia's apartment? He didn't want to think about that possibility. He went around the back of the house and hastily removed his hoodie and wrapped it around his hand. He smashed a small pane of glass in the kitchen window and after carefully removing the remaining fragments he opened the window and scrambled through. He keyed in the code for the alarm and quickly ran down the hall and up the stairs, taking two steps at a time. Outside Jane's door he stopped for a moment listening...Nothing, he couldn't hear any sound from within. Then he remembered the key...It had been on his key-chain... Shit, he mouthed as he ran back down the stairs and into his office, searching for the spare set of keys. He couldn't find them. He was starting to get a bad feeling again. He abandoned the search for the keys and ran back up to Jane's room. Readying himself, he rushed at the door, smashing into it with his shoulder. It creaked but didn't open. He tried again, this time he was rewarded with the sound of splintering wood. The door was solid and it took a further three runs at it before it gave way.

  The first thing he noticed as he unlocked the inner door, was the shape of her body under the duvet. He breathed a sigh of relief, she was still there. Then he saw the blood... It didn't look like much, but he felt that tightening feeling in the pit of his stomach and he knew something was badly wrong. He rushed over to the bed, pulling the duvet swiftly off. He gasped in horror when he saw the amount of blood, and Jane lying as still as a corpse in it. He pulled himself together quickly and felt for a pulse. He found one, though it was quite faint. He quickly tore strips off the sheets and wrapped them tightly around her wrists. Blood was still oozing out, but it looked to him as if she hadn't cut as deeply as she might have. Job done he tried to wake her, but she only flopped against him as he shook her, and she didn't respond to her name. He knew what he had to do. She needed medical care urgently and there was only one person that he trusted to give it to her. Hospitals were out of the question, too many questions and he wasn't ready yet to give up on his plans for a future with Jane.

  Chapter twenty one

  Dr. Nazir Naizi was at home relaxing, he was enjoying the peace and quiet of a rare Monday evening on his own. His wife Maluna had taken the children, three boys, all teenagers now aged between thirteen and sixteen to see her sister. His wife was a pleasant woman but not too easy on the eye. He had married her some twenty five years ago, when he had been thirty five. Theirs had been an arranged marriage and as was not unusual, he hadn't seen her before the marriage ceremony. She had come over from their native Pakistan with her parents to marry him. They were a wealthy affluent family and his new wife's family connections had opened many doors to him that might have otherwise been closed. The moment he laid eyes on her he had been glad that the dowry that accompanied her was so large. She had been a heavy girl with severely pockmarked skin which always looked greasy. He himself would never have won any beauty competitions, he was tall enough, but pudgy with dark bulging eyes that always looked bloodshot. Tho
ugh he would never admit it, it was her money that had enable him to open a private practice in London. It had always been his ambition to have his own practice. Now he lived in a comfortable five bedroomed detached house near Warwick in Essex. He had a residence in London where he lived during most of the week, while he was at his clinic. There he had a housekeeper, whom he paid to look after his every need, she was young only twenty two. She was also from Pakistan, she was the niece of an old friend who had been glad to off load the girl to England. Her parents had both died and her uncle couldn't afford to look after her. Nazir seeing a photo of her on his friends Facebook page had enquired about her. It hadn’t been difficult to get his friend to agree to send her to England, especially as he promised that he would find a suitable husband for her. When she got to England he had indeed given her a job and it wasn't long before he had persuaded her to fulfil his other needs too.

  His mobile rang, he looked at the caller I D; if it was someone of no importance he was going to ignore it. He recognised the name and pressed the answer button. He listened carefully as the man on the other end explained what had happened. Naizi agreed to come immediately. He hung up and quickly gathered together his medical bag and other supplies that he knew he would need. He sighed as he thought of his peaceful evening shattered, but the money he would get for this house visit was a greater lure and he smiled as he drove quickly to his new patient. He had a lucrative practice above board in the city but he also had his side line. It had begun about six months after he had set-up on his own. The practice was taking longer than he expected to attract new patients and he was beginning to wonder if he had been too hasty in trying to set up on his own. Money was tight and his wife’s considerable dowry was almost all used up. Then one day, a woman had entered his office, a woman who was used to getting her way. A haughty aristocratic looking woman. A horsey looking woman with a beak of a nose and a nasally high voice. She was dressed in tweeds with sensible low-heeled shoes on her feet, she looked like someone straight out of “Horse and Hound” She asked him straight out if he would consider preforming an abortion procedure on a young woman. When he had enquired why she didn't just go to an abortion clinic, she had looked horrified. She told him that she couldn't go to a clinic that it had to be done discreetly. She told him it was delicate matter and the woman had pulled out her cheque book and written out a cheque there and then. The amount was so large he couldn't refuse. His morals and ethics went out the window as soon as he accepted that cheque. All he had to do in return was promise total and absolute secrecy. The young woman was due to marry in a few months’ time and had got herself pregnant, unfortunately the baby was not the child of her future husband, and if he or his family were to discover this pregnancy the wedding would be cancelled. That day was the beginning, from then on he had many patients who paid over the odds because they didn't want the public or the press to know of their addictions of follies. He had many famous clients, some from the pop world some from the film industry, others were members of very respectable families. They all had one thing in common. They had a secret they didn't want anyone to find out about. Many had tried to take their own lives and had to have their stomachs pumped. Two had tried to take the lives of another, and the victims had been brought to him to receive medical attention. Both of those had to be paid off very generously to keep their mouths shut. He didn't care who his clients were, all he cared about was the money.

  This guy was beginning to worry him though, he had been called out to his estate before on numerous occasions.

  He was into pain. S & M. Both having it inflicted on himself and on his sexual partners. He had caused horrific injuries to one prostitute. Nazir was uneasy about going to his place. He was sure that it wouldn't be long before he killed someone, or injured someone so severely that they wouldn't want to accept any amount of money. He planned to tell him that this would be his last visit. He didn't want to take the chance of the authorities finding out about his involvement if anything went wrong, it would mean the end of his career and he loved his lifestyle. He loved the finer things in life. He reached the estate gates and phoned ahead to let Richard know of his arrival, he was a lazy man and couldn't be bothered to get out of his car to press the intercom, besides he thought to himself its pouring outside. The gates opened and he drove up to the house. His client was waiting at the front door and he hurriedly explained to Naizi what had happened as he showed him into the room Jane was in. He omitted the fact that she wasn’t here of her own free will. He knew that Naizi would never question him as to the origins of his new patient. He had washed her and dressed her carefully before moving her to a different room.

  Jane's eyes flickered open briefly when she heard the doctor's voice. She tried to focus on his face but couldn't. He looked a bit like that famous painting... The scream... the way his face kept weaving in and out of shape.

  “Help me please.” She pleaded, barely able to get her voice above a whisper.

  “You’re going to be fine” Naizi reassured her.

  He carefully examined her, he un-bandaged her wrists and examined the cuts carefully before re-bandaging them. He noted the bruising on her frail body and the paleness almost translucent quality of her skin.

  “I'm going to have to put her on a drip, she's very dehydrated you will have to change it yourself when it needs replacing. Do you think you can manage that?”

  “Yes, I think I can manage that.” Richard answered. “Will she be alright?”

  “I'm going to give her a sedative that should knock her out for the night. I'll leave you some more to give her when it wears off. She should be fine the cuts aren't too deep, they don't need stitches. Look, Richard this is awkward... I don't want you to call me again. It’s too risky. You're going to have to reign in your behaviour. If you don't, one day it’s all going to get on top of you. I have a young family I can't take the chance any more, you're out of control.” He nervously looked at the other man's face, the only emotion he could detect was a slight hardening of the jaw-line and a narrowing of the eyes. He had expected an onslaught of abuse, but none came. “I can't keep coming out here to your prostitutes.”

  “Yes, yes, you could be right.” He agreed, hiding his fury at the doctor’s comments. His Jane... a prostitute. He felt the rage build up inside and barely managed to keep it in check. How could anyone mistake her for a prostitute? Naizi is right, he thought to himself. This will be your last visit here.

  Nazir bade him goodbye, unaware that he had just sealed his own faith. He hadn't recognised the woman in the bed. Even if he had seen the news reports with her face all over them, it wouldn't have crossed his mind that this was the same woman. So unrecognisable was she.

  Richard to settled Jane, and as he watched her sleep, he fantasised about different ways of killing Naizi, but in the end he decided on one. It had to be quick and simple and more importantly....It would look suicide.

  Chapter twenty two

  It was raining heavy by the time DCI Carter pulled into the public car-park of the hospital. What had started as a light dewy rain was now bucketing down in torrents. She had just left Morley at the police station. He had filled her in on his investigation into Jane Turner's disappearance and they had discussed at length the connections between the dead woman and her missing friend. Morley had promised to return the following day with copies of all the files and statements he had on the case. They both agreed that it was too much of a coincidence for the two cases not to be connected.

  Carter stepped out of her car, pulling her raincoat over her head, she rushed towards the entrance almost colliding with a man who was in an equal hurry to get to his car. She side-stepped, landing one foot squarely into a large puddle, cursing she hurried in, her shoe making squelching noises with each step. At the Information desk she showed her ID and asked for directions to Anna Cotter's room. At the nurses’ station, she asked to see Anna. With a disapproving look from the sister on duty she was led to the private room. The PC on duty outside Anna'
s room stood up quickly when he saw Carter approaching. After a brief conversation with him, she knocked gently and entered the room.

  Anna had been dozing and was momentarily startled by the sudden appearance of Carter.

  “Miss Cotter, I'm sorry to disturb you so late, I'm DCI Carter. I'm in charge of the case involving the death of Ms Cavendish. I was wondering if you could answer just a few questions.”

  “Hi, yeah sure, though I've told Inspector Morley everything I know.” Anna said raising herself into a sitting position and wedging the pillows behind her back.