‘Old Lane Secondary. Why?’
They left their half-finished drinks on the table as Rita headed for the exit, dragging Chris behind her, as Ronnie O’Sullivan settled down over the snooker table and attempted to pot a tricky green.
Greg Nicol opened his front door to see a strange specimen stood before him, grinning widely.
‘Hello?’ said Greg.
The strange man bowed slightly, then straightened up. He wore a long, dark purple coat that had seen better days, and his skin seemed as white as freshly fallen snow.
‘And you must be one Mr Gregory Nicol,’ said the visitor, his voice honeyed and posh. The voice was British, though for the life of him Greg was sure he’d never heard such an accent before.
‘That’s right,’ said Greg. ‘Can I help you?’
‘Yes, I understand that you can. May I be granted entrance to your charming home?’
Greg must have agreed and let the man in, because a few short minutes later he found himself handing the man a mug of tea, though he did not recall actually agreeing, nor the man entering his house. It was the strain of Jane going missing, that was it. The lack of sleep, the lack of resolution. That feeling of being in limbo. No word, no body, alive or dead, impossible to say; Schrodinger's Corpse.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Greg, sitting down in an armchair, ‘I’m sure I’ve already asked you, and you’ve already told me, but I’m not really on the ball at the moment. Who are you?’
‘My name is Carlisle, and I’m here about the missing woman.’
‘Are you police? A detective?’
‘If you like,’ said Carlisle, and reached into an inside pocket of his coat. As he did so, Greg caught a glimpse of the lining and was sure he saw colours dancing, stars twinkling.
‘Here,’ said Carlisle, holding up a piece of card, ‘my credentials.’
Greg peered at the card and felt a little queasy. There was one card, but there were also two cards, and Greg’s poor stomach churned as his eyes strained. One of the cards appeared to be a yellowed with age, and of course now useless, Blockbuster Video membership card. The second card announced his visitor as Detective Inspector Carlisle.
‘My credentials,’ said the man again, his voice warm as it flowed into Greg’s ears. He blinked and the sick feeling vanished, as did the Blockbuster Video card. The man, Carlisle, held only one card, and it showed he was indeed a detective here about Jane.
‘Is there any news?’ Greg asked warily. Any visit or phone call from the police made him worry that this would be when the bad news finally arrived and triggered his complete mental collapse.
‘I have no idea,’ replied Carlisle, taking a sip of tea.
‘Oh. Right. So why are you here?’
‘As you said when you greeted me at the door, you can help me.’
Greg was confused by this and again began to wonder about the Blockbuster Video card. Surely it had been that after all?
‘What can you tell me about the disappearance of your partner?’
‘Well, I’ve already told you lot everything I know over and over, I’m not sure I have anything else I can add.’
Greg looked at the man’s clothes again. The strange, ragged coat, the big, scuffed, heavy boots, and thought it was a very strange way for a detective to dress. Greg now noticed with some concern that the man appeared to be sniffing at the air like a dog. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘Something has been here.’
The man placed his cup of tea on a sideboard and fell to his hands and knees, sniffing at the carpet.
‘Could I look at your identification again?’ Greg asked.
The man slapped the floor with one hand then leapt back to his feet and strode towards him, causing Greg to back up until the wall stopped him.
‘Something has been here,’ said the man again, looking down at him. Greg was a reasonable height, but the man, Carlisle, towered over him.
‘I don’t understand what you mean.’
‘Neither do I. Not exactly. But I can smell it. Taste it. Something to do with… dreams.’
Greg blinked.
‘Tell me about dreams, Greg.’
‘Well, it’s like I said to the other detective—’
‘Other detective?’
‘Yes, DS Hobbes. Jane has always had these bad dreams. These nightmares.’
‘Yes, yes, yes, that’s it! Not just dreams, nightmares.’ The man turned on his heels and headed for the door. ‘What was the nightmare about?’
‘Jane said she used to see a man in an old rabbit mask.’
The strange perhaps-detective paused in the doorway and glanced back, his brow knotted. ‘I am very sorry for your loss.’
The words hung heavy in the air as the man left and the front door opened and closed.
Greg felt the words slowly become part of him.
Felt the truth of those parting words.
Loss.
He knew it was true.
Jane was never coming back.
Three hours later Greg was still curled up in a ball on the carpet.
Rita didn’t like Gemma Wheeler’s house. It was too neat, too orderly, too sparse. It was one of those homes that looked like nobody actually lived there at all.
‘What’s this about, Chris?’ asked Gemma, who looked a lot like a chubbier version of Chris in a long, curly wig.
‘This is Rita, my…’ he looked to her for guidance.
‘Colleague.’
‘Right. Just my colleague and, sort of, acquaintance.’
‘Okay. So…?’
‘Gemma,’ said Rita, ‘have you heard about the two women who went missing recently?’
‘Yeah. It’s been on the local news and that, hasn’t it. Terrible stuff. Makes you worry. Why?’
‘Well,’ said Chris, ‘it’s just Rita here’s on that case, and I thought you might be able to help. Sort of.’
Gemma looked blankly at her cousin.
‘Jane and Ellie, did you know them?’ asked Rita.
‘Yeah. Well, I didn’t know them know them, if you get me. But they were in my year at school, so I knew who they were. We weren’t friends or anything though. Spoke a couple of times maybe.’
‘The couple of times you spoke, did the subject of dreams ever come up?’
There was that blank look again. ‘Dreams?’
‘Gemma, tell Rita what you told me about your nightmares. That thing you’ve dreamed about on and off since you were little.’
‘Why?’
‘Gemma,’ said Rita, ‘do you dream about a man in a rabbit mask?’
Gemma’s face flushed and she took a step back. ‘Why’d you tell her about that? That’s private, Chris!’
‘Jane and Ellie, they had that recurring nightmare, too,’ said Rita, pressing on.
‘What? That’s… well, that’s weird, isn’t it?’
Rita and Chris both agreed that it was weird.
Gemma stepped back again, for a second Rita thought she might actually collapse, she’d gone so pale, but instead she slowly lowered herself down on to the couch. ‘I don’t like that dream,’ she said. ‘The rabbit mask dream. I don’t like it.’
‘What happens in the dream, exactly?’ asked Rita.
‘Nothing. Not really. At least nothing I can remember. I just have this person in a rabbit mask, and I don’t like the rabbit mask, it’s old and mouldy, and I know it stinks, and I can hear his breath in there.’
Gemma was starting to clench her fists, over and over, Chris sat next to her, trying to calm her.
‘I can hear his breath rasping against the inside of the rabbit mask and I’m really, really scared he’s going to take the thing off and I’ll see what’s underneath and I know if I see it I’m going to lose my mind. I feel like he wants me for something. Has always wanted me for something, and there’s nothing I can do.’
‘Okay, that’s enough,’ said Chris, as a tear began to roll down Gemma’s cheek.
‘How can the three of u
s have the same nightmare?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Rita, wishing she had something soothing to tell the poor woman. ‘The dream, the nightmare, have you had it more often recently?’
Gemma Wheeler nodded, and Rita began to feel very worried indeed.
Rita’s phone informed her that it had just passed 2 a.m. and she wondered again just what the hell she was doing sat in her car staking out the home of Gemma Wheeler.
Chris had gone on shift, so for the last five hours, Rita had been alone in her car, waiting for.... well, waiting for something. It was fair to say that they’d worried Gemma with their visit, and Rita felt a responsibility. To what? To stop anything bad happening to Gemma? She realised that in many ways, this was crazy. That she’d taken it upon herself to become a woman’s bodyguard because she shared a nightmare with two missing persons.
She’d already ignored two calls from Waterson—who was no doubt wondering why his partner had gone M.I.A—but how could she explain what she was doing to him, or to anyone else? It was clear he thought she was bonkers for deciding that the dreams were a line of enquiry worth pursuing. She couldn’t say she blamed him. It was bonkers, but it also felt so completely and utterly right.
She thought about Chris, about how he’d come to her with information about his cousin and the dream. He’d not questioned things, hadn’t said anything about it being a mad coincidence, he’d just picked up the thread and handed it over. Rita couldn’t help but feel a little grateful, not to mention impressed. Chris had a more open mind, clearly, than many others on the force.
Oh God, thought Rita, don’t go getting real feelings for him.
She didn’t notice when her eyes grew heavy and started to droop, but at some point she realised she was no longer sat inside her car in the middle of the night, but was now stepping on to Blackpool beach, looking out at the sea.
There’s something in there.
Beneath the waves.
Something dark and terrible and ancient beyond words.
It was out there, the thing, desperate to break the surface and step on to the land again.
What was it?
It wasn’t a person, it was definitely an it.
‘We fought it,’ said a glowing man with great wings attached to his back and a halo shining so brightly it hurt to look at. ‘We fought for centuries, the sky burning with fire. And we won. We stopped the beast it had become.’
Rita nodded like she understood. Maybe in the dream she did, for a moment.
Then she looked out to sea and saw something awful dragging itself out of the waves and rushing, screaming towards her.
Rita awoke with a start, reflexively pushing herself backwards before she realised where she was. She wasn’t on the beach, she was in her car, and it was bloody freezing. It was now just past four in the morning, and Rita decided she’d had enough. She reached over to the car key and was about to turn it, when she noticed the face staring in at her from the passenger seat window.
Only it wasn’t a face, not as such. It was a mask. A tattered old rabbit mask.
‘Shit!’ Rita jumped back, but the figure was gone. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’
She looked around, out of every window, jerking her head this way and that, but she couldn’t see the rabbit-masked figure anywhere.
‘What the fuck?’ she said quietly, and began to worry he’d just ducked down out of view. That he was crouched low and out of sight, ready to scare her again, or worse, grab her.
Maybe it was just a remnant of the dream? Yeah, that could be it. She’d been having a weird dream, and when she was still just half-awake, still caught in the dream’s wake, she’d seen something that wasn’t there.
But what if…?
She looked over to Gemma Wheeler’s house.
The front door was wide open.
‘Shit, shit, shit!’
Rita threw the car door open and half-jumped, half-fell out of it, racing towards the house, pulling out her standard issue baton and flicking it to full extension.
‘Gemma!’
She ran through the open door, sprinting from room to room, but she already knew. Somehow you can just tell when a house is empty. You feel it, hear it.
Rabbit Mask had been there.
And now Gemma was gone.
9
DCI Jenner sat low in his chair and rubbed at his eyes. ‘So, the man in the mask was there, and then he wasn’t?’
‘I know how it sounds,’ replied Rita. ‘I mean, it sounds mental. I sound like a mental person.’
‘Agreed,’ said Jenner, looking over to Waterson, who was stood mute at Rita’s side. ‘And did you see this incredible disappearing fancy dress man?’
‘I wasn’t there, Sir.’
‘I was following my instinct on my own, Guv,’ said Rita.
Jenner sat back in his chair and Rita could practically feel the weary annoyance emanating from him.
‘With all due respect, a woman did go missing,’ said Rita, steaming ahead, ‘Gemma Wheeler, she’s gone. She told me she had the same dream as the first two women, and now she’s gone.’
‘We don’t know that yet for sure,’ Waterson cut in.
Rita turned to him and tried very, very hard not to punch him in the face. ‘I saw the man in the rabbit mask. Her door was wide open, phone and money left behind. Gemma gone, same as the others. On top of that, she’s the same age, even knew the other two. Well, a little bit.’
Waterson raised his hands and eyebrows and took a step back. ‘I agree, there’s a pattern, but it’s only been hours since she was last seen. That’s not enough to write her up as a missing person.’
Rita may have said a swear word or two, then turned back to Jenner. ‘Guv. They’re linked. You must see that.’
Jenner sighed, then nodded. ‘Yes. There’s a link. An actual, solid link that you can follow. Same age. All women. All went to the same school. That’s what you dig into, agreed?’
‘Agreed,’ said Waterson, making sure he was out of his partner’s range.
Rita wanted to voice her complaint, but she could see she wasn’t going to win that battle. Fine. If neither of these stupid men wanted to include the rabbit mask dream into the overall picture, then she’d include it on her own.
Clear of Jenner’s office, Rita attempted to bore a hole through Waterson’s head with her eyes.
‘Hey, stop that,’ said Waterson, swatting the imaginary laser beams aside.
‘Thanks for the back-up, partner,’ Rita spat.
‘What do you want me to do? You’re talking about dreams, Rita. We can’t build a case on mask-wearing dream people. Dreams aren’t taking these women, a person is.’
‘Okay, it’s weird, Waters, I get that, right, but it’s something.’
Waterson dipped his head and sighed, then looked back up at her. ‘Rita, I’ve followed you down some weird old paths, but I’m not gonna play the Scully to your Mulder this time. For one thing, I don’t have the legs for a skirt.’
Rita glared at Waterson.
‘Not gonna crack a smile at that, eh?’
She was not.
After the third furious round of drivers spanking their horns at her, Rita thought it best that she stopped driving angry and pulled over until she’d calmed down.
She yanked the wheel over, parked up, and stomped towards the beach. Rita had never really cared for the beach, to her it just highlighted the fact that she was on the edge of things. Away from anything interesting. Away from a better, new life.
Plus she’d had sex on the beach once and the sand had got everywhere. Everywhere. You don’t forget that sort of chafing in a hurry.
She sat down heavily, dug her hands into the sand, and threw a great clump of it at the water. The wind caught it and threw it right back at her.
‘Stupid, fucking wind!’ she yelled, before looking around to make sure no one had seen her picking a fight with the wind.
She wanted to be angry with Waterson. No, actually, she wanted to be
completely bloody furious at him. The problem was, she could see where he was coming from. DCI Jenner, too. She knew they were right. What use was it chasing a nightmare? It’s not like they could lock the thing up. And apart from asking every woman in Blackpool of a similar age to Gemma and the other missing women if they’d ever dreamt about a rabbit mask, it was useless as a means of finding other potential victims.
And here was the main point: it didn’t help her find those who had already gone missing. It was a link, a really bloody strange link, but it didn’t help her get any closer to finding out what had happened to them, or where they were. Waterson was right. Not that she’d ever tell him that. But he was right. They had to work the other, tangible facts. Chasing phantoms wasn’t going to save those women, or any others.
‘DS Rita Hobbes, is that you?’
Rita jerked back at the sudden intrusion to see a tall, pallid man in a purple coat smiling down at her.
‘Who’s asking?’ she replied, pushing herself up on to her feet and taking a step back to create a safer distance from the man, her hand ready to pull her extendable baton.
‘We met at some police function or other, I think. Don’t tell me you don’t remember.’
Rita peered closer at the man and found herself caught by his wide, dark eyes. They seemed to almost shimmer. To draw her in. To make her not want to look away. ‘Function?’
‘Yes. Two years ago, perhaps? I’m DI Carlisle, do you remember me now?’
Rita shook her head, breaking eye contact. It felt like she’d taken four shots of vodka in quick succession. ‘Two years?’
‘That’s right. We met and spoke, very briefly.’
Something seemed to tease at her memory. It was like she almost believed him. Almost. ‘Can I see some I.D?’
The man’s smile grew somehow wider, revealing more teeth than seemed possible for one person’s mouth. ‘But of course. Where are my manners?’ He reached into his coat and pulled out a card. ‘There, look, DI Carlisle.’
Rita looked at the card, then back at the pale, tall man, and then back at the card again. ‘I see,’ she said.
The man nodded and pocketed the card again.
Hexed Detective Page 6