by Ted Tayler
“Here I am” Colin said “was there something in particular you wanted?
Athena was so close her perfume invaded his nostrils; he felt his body respond immediately. All her previous indifference and frostiness was gone. She rose up onto her knees and rested her hands on his shoulders.
“I don’t want to be alone tonight” she said “with my mother facing that operation first thing tomorrow. Would you just hold me Phoenix? Please?
Colin’s erection did the sensible thing and retired for the night.
“Of course Athena” Colin replied.
He lay down beside her and she soon dropped off to sleep with her head on his chest and his arms around her. As he lay there, listening to her steady relaxed breathing, he thought what a funny old world it was. Colin Bailey, the stone cold killer had been transformed into the perfect gentleman by a goddess. Well, at least for one night!
CHAPTER 22
Colin had felt Athena stir and move gently away from him; it was dark and she was obviously leaving the stable block before anyone discovered she had spent the night there, however innocent it may have been. Before she left she had kissed him softly on his forehead.
It was time to get up and head for the shower; a cold one today, he thought despite the chill of the late October morning. His next port of call was the swimming pool and while he was ploughing his way up and down his lane, Rusty appeared for his daily workout. Rusty called out to him.
“Good night last night Phoenix?”
Colin ignored him at first but Rusty wouldn’t let it go.
“A cosy drive back with her ladyship eh; did you come straight back or did you take the pretty route?”
Colin realised Rusty was on about earlier last evening; he was unaware of his overnight guest, thank goodness!
“We came straight home. I got a summons and a mild bollocking from Erebus about you know what; then I had an early night. Athena was on about going for a swim as I recall. How did our visitors spend the night?”
“Uncomfortably” said Rusty “it ain’t the Hilton they’re running at the bottom of the ice house and they would have had an early call this morning. They’re being invited to give a little speech for the next few hours; the sooner they co-operate the longer it will be before they join that Zunairah character. She‘s got a nice spot under the shade of a beech tree as I understand it. A crew took her down at half past seven.”
Colin could still remember the look on Zunairah’s face as he had pressed the gun against her head. There was no fear of death in those eyes, just hatred. He wondered briefly whether he should be regretting having pulled the trigger, knowing what he knew now; that she couldn’t have exploded any of the bombs with the phone she had selected, but he cast the thought aside. She had made her choice to die yesterday and he wasn’t going to risk her taking anyone else with her if he could help it. He resumed his swim content that he had done the right thing.
“Fancy a brekkie later, mate?” called Rusty as he caught him up in the next lane.
“Sounds like a plan” called Colin as he sprinted away from his colleague.
The morning passed uneventfully after that. Colin and Rusty had a full English and several rounds of toast, washed down with mugs of coffee. The items Colin needed for the trip to Scotland on Sunday arrived at his quarters as promised. In addition, there was even a reassuringly well stuffed envelope which had ‘Holiday Money’ scribbled on the outside that was hand delivered by one of the stewards from the main building in the early afternoon. Colin felt a bit like a kept man; he wished he could get his own finances sorted out but he had to face facts, it would be some time before he was declared ‘legally’ dead.
Colin spent the afternoon preparing for his next mission; going over his plan for Donald MacDonald for the umpteenth time. He wandered down to the canteen for a light meal in the early evening; he wasn’t overly hungry and he planned to start working out where to spend his time off as soon as he got back. When he had eaten and was leaving the canteen he saw Athena making her way across the lawns towards him.
There was an awkward moment when they stopped and started talking at the same time.
“Sorry” said Colin “you first. Tell me about your Mum, how is she?”
Athena brushed his cheek with the tips of her fingers briefly.
“Daddy says the operation went fine; she’s attached to various tubes, drips and drains at present, which make things look far worse than they probably are. She’s still drowsy and in some discomfort this evening but they’ll have her out of bed and sat in a chair tomorrow. Daddy says she should be home in a week and then its three months allowing the body to heal.”
“Will he be on his own with her during that time or will Erebus let you have some leave to help out?”
“Daddy is arranging for a nurse to live in, certainly for the first couple of months; he can’t sit around the house for too long, he’d go nuts! I’ll ask Erebus for the occasional weekend off, but with the scale of operations we are dealing with at Olympus globally at present, I can’t be spared too often.
When she has fully recovered from her operation, it is important she adopts a healthy lifestyle to reduce the risk of developing further heart problems in the future. We need to get her to stop smoking, to start eating healthily, to drink less and at least exercise a little bit!”
“I’m glad she’s through the first part anyway” said Colin and Athena squeezed his arm.
“Thank you for last night” she whispered “it was sweet of you not to take advantage of me.”
“That’s funny” replied Colin “that’s exactly what I was going to say!”
Athena smiled. “You’ve eaten I take it?” she asked.
Colin nodded “I was just going back to my room to decide where I might spend my few days off. Erebus told you I wasn’t coming straight back after Dunfermline I assume?”
“He did and he also asked if I had any objection to you being sent out into the field to live somewhere appropriate for any future direct actions you might undertake for us. I told him I wanted you to stay here at Larcombe permanently.”
“Really?” said Colin “do you still feel you need to keep an eye on me?”
“No Phoenix” she said as she started to walk away from him towards the canteen “I can’t bear the thought of you being hundreds of miles away when I might need you to hold me like you did last night.”
Athena stopped. She walked back and held his hands in hers.
“It’s been a long time” she said “be patient with me.”
Colin kissed her softly on her lips.
“I’ll see you when I get back from my holiday Athena; take care until then.”
Athena went towards the canteen and Colin headed off to the stable block. He turned to glance back as he neared his quarters and Athena was standing by the door to the building, waiting for him to look her way. She waved briefly and went inside.
Colin set about planning his holiday and couldn’t concentrate on anywhere or anything. All he could think about was how great it had been to kiss her; he imagined kissing her body from tip to toe.
“Another cold shower before bed” he groaned “and up early in the morning to see if I can’t finally plan this bloody holiday!”
Colin was at Bath Spa station yet again on Monday; the first leg of his journey was about to begin. He had everything he needed in his trusty rucksack for his mission and his short break. He also had a sizeable wedge of notes to buy anything else he needed that he wasn’t carrying with him.
He hadn’t seen Athena since that Friday evening; Erebus and the others had occupied her time pretty much completely on Olympus business. There had been no further updates on her mother’s progress; Colin assumed that no news was good news.
The train left the station on the short hop to Bristol. Colin looked out of the window and was glad that once his holiday was over, he’d be returning to the Roman city. He hadn’t fancied pitching up in a strange town and starting afresh. He also
had the promise of a relationship with Athena to come back for; how important that relationship would be in his life he couldn’t tell yet, but it was looking pretty good at the moment!
Colin knew that the next six or seven hours were going to be a drag; trekking across country to Birmingham New Street, then up the west coast further and further north until he arrived in Edinburgh. He soon found his eyes were dropping and he was asleep while the train plodded through to Gloucester and Cheltenham; he was changing trains again before he knew it. While he was at Birmingham he had a couple of minutes to spare, so he bought a magazine and a hot sausage roll. When he looked at the change he’d got from a tenner he wondered how long the money he had would last him! Things had got dearer even since he’d returned from The Gambia.
The sausage roll was great though and the magazine kept his interest for some time, so it wasn’t all bad. He needed something to occupy his mind; staring out of the window as the train made its way through the last of the Midlands was not really an option. Colin watched the changing scenery on the other side of the glass and ticked off the stations as he travelled further up country. As the train threaded its way through the busy traffic hub of Crewe Colin thought that although the price of a sausage roll has changed dramatically, some things don’t change that much.
Colin at last stood on the platform at Edinburgh waiting for his final connecting train. Just over half an hour later Colin walked out of the station at Dunfermline; it was almost nine o’clock. It was bloody cold; well what did he expect in late October in Scotland?
His research had found a reasonable bed and breakfast within a short walk of the station and it wasn’t long before he was unpacking his overnight things from his rucksack. He hit the hay knowing that if everything went to plan then he’d be off on his holiday within twenty four hours.
Donald MacDonald was in his customary position; he was sat in his car watching the children as they arrived to start the school day. He was slumped down a little so that from the other side of the green opposite the school gates, it was virtually impossible to see whether there was anyone in the car at all.
He had left the house at a quarter to eight as usual, after what had become his staple breakfast diet; a bowl of porridge and a tumbler of whisky. Donald MacDonald was on a slippery slope.
His career had gone down the toilet. Despite all the evidence, Donald believed he had been stitched up by the two sisters and even complained to the few friends he had left that the pathetic community sentence he had received had been punitive.
The crafty copper conveniently forgot about all the other young girls who had been sweet talked into giving him favours to stop him telling their parents tales about what they’d been up to.
“If I turn up at your house, in my police car, in my uniform and say you were smoking and drinking lager in the park; who do you think your mammy’s going to believe, eh? Right then darling, perhaps there’s a way we can make this problem go away.”
That slippery slope had led him on to more and more material being downloaded from the internet; particularly after his father had gone into the home. Somehow Donald had managed to keep that pretty quiet; one of the factors behind the leniency of his sentence had been his invalid father after all. Donald’s brief had painted a sad and sorry picture of the effects on his father’s life if Donald, his sole carer, was to be given a custodial sentence.
With his father out of the way, and Donald’s ‘sole carer’ role discarded without a backward look, there was no one to see what he was getting up to; Donald could watch what he liked when he liked. The more he watched, the more he wanted to act out his fantasies. Somewhere deep inside him was a ‘good angel’ telling him it was wrong and that he should get help; the whisky helped to drown out that voice.
It was taking larger and larger amounts to shut the angel up these days; Donald couldn’t function without a drink inside him as soon as he awoke. The devil angel on his other shoulder was winning the battle and Donald’s visits to the school were now a daily occurrence during term time. To begin with, he had just been looking. In the last couple of weeks he had been taking photographs of some of the prettier girls. The surveillance section at Larcombe Manor had identified most of them from Donald’s computer.
Donald was perhaps only a day or two away from selecting his target. He had driven around this area so often over the past twenty odd years; he knew the streets like the back of his hand. The nights were drawing in quickly now; A few of the children he was watching attended after school clubs and a couple of his favourites walked home alone after four o’clock in the afternoon. He planned to follow them and choose his spot. Once they were in his car his fantasies could become reality.
The final late arrivals ran through the school gates before they were locked and Donald drove his car back home. He planned to spend the next few hours looking at his picture collection. Maybe today he could finally decide which girl to abduct.
Colin had checked out of his room and was walking around the town. He knew where his target lived but he didn’t plan on going anywhere near there. The dossier that he had studied meticulously at Larcombe had suggested where Donald would be later that afternoon. Colin pulled his coat closer around him and leaned into the cold wind. The rucksack on his shoulder contained the few necessities that he had selected for this mission. The cold weather kept most of the town’s folk indoors, so very few people saw a stranger wandering past the shops and heading out towards one of the town’s bigger schools.
Colin was in position; he was able to watch for Donald’s arrival without attracting attention to himself. He had a picture of the policeman’s car and its registration number. School was out in less than half an hour; Donald wouldn’t miss that. Colin eased the rucksack from his shoulder and removed a few items, putting them into his coat pockets for a speedy retrieval.
It was almost three o’clock when Colin spotted him. Donald MacDonald’s car turned into the tree lined road and headed for the next junction. He executed a sharp right turn across a line of cars arriving on the school run and almost collided with one lady in a people carrier. She sounded her horn and if Colin’s lip reading was accurate at that distance with a small pair of field glasses, she questioned his parentage.
Donald’s progress was a little unsteady as he stuttered and weaved his way into a space on the far side of the green in front of the school gates and parked up. Colin studied the man. Donald was already drinking from a hip flask.
Colin moved quickly and quietly, approaching the car from the rear. Donald was preoccupied with the activity around the school gates as children came spilling out. He was drunk as usual and this had made him careless. His doors were unlocked!
“Makes my job even easier!” thought Colin, who was inside the car in a second. He wrapped his hand over the nose and mouth of the former policeman and let the chloroform soaked cloth do its work. Donald was in no condition to struggle; the whisky had virtually incapacitated him before Colin arrived anyway and being slumped down in the seat to avoid people seeing him was just asking for trouble.
Donald’s vision and hearing began to fail; he was unconscious within seconds. Colin knew that he needed to keep the cloth in place so that Donald wouldn’t wake up for a while. It was a fine balance; if Donald was under for some time he could die from heart or respiratory failure. Colin wanted the coroner to be in no doubt that this death was self inflicted.
The clock was ticking ever onward. All of the children had been picked up by their loving parents; many had scampered home alone; others lingered in the nearby roads chatting with their friends.
Meanwhile, in the car Colin patiently waited for the more comforting safety of the night. He checked that Donald was still under and got out of the car. He quickly set about completing the final stages of his plan and took two envelopes from his rucksack. These he placed on the dashboard. His final task was to switch on the car’s engine. Donald was still away with the fairies when Colin removed the cloth from his face.
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Colin closed the car door, slipped his rucksack back over his shoulder and went back to the spot he had chosen to observe from initially. He watched and waited. Deep in the Honda Jazz nothing stirred.
At six o’clock he decided enough was enough; it was time to leave Dunfermline, as pleasant as his stay had been he was now officially on holiday. The sooner he got a couple of hundred miles south, where it might be a little warmer the better. He began the walk back to the station.
The parked car was unattended, but to the police who arrived at eight o’clock, it was immediately clear something was amiss. They had been summoned by a dog walker who heard a car engine as they were passing and had strolled over to take a peek. A dryer vent hose connected to the car’s exhaust pipe was wedged in the rear passenger door. Inside the vehicle was a middle aged man; he was dishevelled, smelled of booze and almost laid down in the driver’s seat. There were two letters; one was addressed to John MacDonald of Brae side Home for the Elderly and one to ‘Whoever finds me’.
The police read this letter and the driver’s intentions were pretty explicit:-
‘To whoever finds this note I have hopefully committed suicide. I take complete and sole responsibility for my present situation. I have done things of which I am ashamed; if I continue to live then I will offend again and ultimately commit more serious crimes’ the letter read. Colin had already congratulated the team at Larcombe on the excellence of the handwriting and the overall tenor of the note.
The team had to thank the quick thinking agent who had scanned a couple of examples of Donald MacDonald’s handwriting when he had been waiting for the downloaded files to transfer to his memory stick.
In time the police would deliver Donald’s father’s letter unopened and a verdict of suicide would subsequently be duly recorded. As Erebus and the others back at Larcombe Manor suspected; after the police visit to the MacDonald household, they uncovered the same incriminating files on Donald’s computer, and the carpet was swiftly raised so that the evidence could be neatly brushed away.