by Chris Thomas
‘I doubt it very much. It was one of the most closely guarded new identities I can remember. When you consider the media furore that accompanied her trial, it’s not surprising. To most of her neighbours she was probably just another jobless wonder who had chosen their pretty, and cheap, little corner of England to live out her benefit-scum lifestyle.’
‘So, why was it flagged up as potential cyber interest?’ he asked, intrigued by such a high profile missing person, despite cases of this nature being a little out of his area of expertise.
‘Not sure, maybe one of the investigating officers just got a bit over-zealous and clicked every department in the hope that someone might be able shed a little light.’
‘Interesting,’ replied Pete, clicking out of the case file. He took a sip of coffee. Finally, it had cooled down to a temperature slightly less than molten iron. ‘I’ll have a look through the rest of these, see if there’s anything I can help with.’
‘Right,’ said Grace, lifting herself out of the chair. She started to walk away but then turned back and leant on the desk beside him. ‘Look, Pete, it’s really good to have you back, but if you need to take some time out, or you need anything for you or Olivia, just say so, OK?’
‘I’m fine,’ he said, unconvincingly. He could tell from her slanted facial expression that she wasn’t convinced. ‘Honestly. I’ll let you know if I need anything. I promise.’
Grace patted him on the shoulder and walked off. Taking another sip of coffee, he settled back into his desk. Numerous questions about the MISPER still bothered him. Having worked on various cases involving suspects with electronic tags, he had become very familiar with the technology. It shouldn’t be possible to just remove one. Especially for someone as mentally simple as her. And where had she gone? Someone as fat as she appeared to be would barely be able to walk ten yards outside her front door without breaking out in a semi-asthmatic wheezing fit, drenched in sweat.
He opened a new Google search and typed her real name in. The countless news stories about her crime were nothing new; he remembered them vividly from when the country was first informed, months before her name was made public. There would have been few people who weren’t filled with rage and disgust when the details started to emerge.
But he knew what it was like for the victims of crimes when the perpetrators went missing; the worry that they could be out there somewhere. Now she was missing and he felt obligated to try and find her.
11
‘Good morning, sir,’ said Gilbert, as he placed a silver serving tray on the coffee table in the corner of the bedroom.
Alistair was already awake, sat at the writing desk typing away intently on the laptop in front of him.
‘Ah, breakfast. Excellent. Thank you, Gilbert. Most important meal of the day you know.’ He stopped typing and walked over to the coffee table.
Breakfast was always the same on the day of a show. Three rashers of bacon, two sausages, sautéed potatoes, black pudding, and two fried eggs. A freshly brewed pot of kopi lewak coffee sat to the side, along with a shot glass of whiskey, just to finish it all off. Usually, breakfast was a lot healthier; granola, natural yoghurt, a mixture of berries of some description, but this alternative set him up properly for the day. A little later, when he needed some adrenaline and energy, he would work it off with a thumping heavy bag workout in his gym.
‘Today’s the day then,’ said Gilbert, as he poured a cup of coffee. ‘This is going to be a big one, I feel.’
‘Absolutely,’ replied Alistair, as he dipped a potato in the runny yellow yolk. ‘Planned down to microscopic levels. I assume Jarvis has completed the extra encryption algorithms?’
‘I believe so, yes. Having two people will invariably take a little longer, so he’s strengthened all the firewalls and increased the levels of encryption. Not even the CIA, GCHQ, NSA, or any other letter-based organisation will be able to trace it.’
Alistair chuckled. ‘Good man. And the venue?’
‘Eric and Stan are down there now. The set itself is all ready to go. They’re just going over the final security arrangements, sorting out the entrances, local CCTVs, that kind of thing.’
‘Excellent. Thank you, Gilbert.’
Gilbert nodded and made for the exit. After a few steps he paused and ran his hand through his wavy brown hair. He turned back towards the table, to Alistair, who had yet to notice that he was still there.
‘Alistair?’ he asked, tentatively.
Looking up and chewing on a mouthful of meat, Alistair mumbled a muffled, ‘Yes?’
‘Can I talk to you about this one?’
Alistair finished his mouthful and dabbed the corner of his mouth with a pristine white serviette. He motioned with his hand for Gilbert to sit down; he duly obliged.
‘What’s up?’ he asked, casually.
‘Well, there’s just something about this one that’s bothering me,’ replied Gilbert.
‘Oh?’ asked Alistair. He stabbed a piece of bacon with his fork, then a piece of sausage, then some black pudding, and finally an eggy potato, before putting the whole lot in his mouth and settling back into the sofa to listen.
‘It’s probably nothing, but I’m just wondering whether people might object.’
Alistair put his fist over his mouth to prevent spraying food all over the place, whilst simultaneously trying hard not to choke.
‘Object?’ he asked, once his mouth was clear enough.
‘I know that sounds strange, given the nature of what we do here. But this woman is an utter fucking retard, excuse my French. Don’t get me wrong, I can’t stand her and thinking about what she did makes me want to put her out of her misery right now—’
‘So what’s the problem?’ interrupted Alistair.
‘Do you think there is a risk that our viewers might, I don’t know, feel sorry for her? The paedophiles, rapists, and other scum of the Earth that we dispatch, I couldn’t care less for, nor would I expect the viewers to. But I just wonder whether some people might object to our treatment of her on the basis that she isn’t sufficiently intelligent to have any comprehension of either what she has done or what is happening to her.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ replied Alistair, frankly. ‘We do what we do because it is right, it is making good an injustice. The people who subscribe, they want the same thing. If they don’t agree with what we’re doing then they don’t have to watch. It’s a little late in the day to start having doubts about the morality of this operation.’
‘I’m not,’ Gilbert hastened to add. ‘I just don’t want to put our group and its goals at risk. We’ve all worked too hard to make this work.’
‘I agree,’ said Alistair, softly, as he stood up from the sofa and walked behind Gilbert. As Gilbert tried to stand too, he placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m the last person in this world who wants to jeopardise anything. We’re not doing this for the money, right? We’re not doing this for the publicity, right? The only way we can carry on doing this is by putting in place a sheer number of measures to stop us ever being found. Even if a viewer or two had some bizarre pang of conscience, what are they going to do about it? They can’t really go to the police because they will be indicting themselves, but if they did, we’d be long gone and all history of the show online would have been destroyed. Plus, I doubt very much that they would have come across our little programme if they weren’t of a certain personality persuasion. Anyway, I think we’re safe with this one. People were so repulsed with her crime that I can’t see anyone raising objections.’
‘I know you’re right, of course. I didn’t mean to talk out of turn,’ said Gilbert, standing. ‘What we’re doing is ground-breaking and long may it continue. To the Brotherhood!’
‘The Brotherhood,’ replied Alistair, embracing him in a hug.
‘I’ll go and see to the arrangements for our guests, make sure they’re ready.’
‘Thank you, Gilbert.’
Gilbert turned and walke
d through the large ornate double doors that opened from the bedroom out on to the landing, closing them behind him. Alistair took his cup of coffee from the table and sat back down, cross-legged, on the sofa. He stared at the doors for a few seconds before pulling a mobile phone from his dressing gown pocket. He scrolled through the list of last numbers dialled and pressed one.
‘It’s me. Has Gilbert spoken to you about tonight’s show? Oh OK … No, just something he mentioned to me … I’m sure he’ll be fine. Ha ha, no, I don’t think there will be any need for that! ... Just checking, but it might be worth keeping an eye on him … Of course I trust him … OK, I’ll speak to you in a bit. I’m going for a swim.’
With that, Alistair hung up the phone. Swimming on a full stomach was generally frowned upon, but Alistair had never understood it. If anything, he swam better on a full stomach, especially a full English. He slid his feet into his slippers as he left the bedroom. Just outside, on the landing, he unplugged the Segway from the charging point and quietly rode off down the corridor in the direction of the swimming pool complex. The countdown to show-time had begun, and it was time to start preparing.
12
After what seemed like miles, Daisy finally stopped running. The last of the alcohol had ebbed from her system and the effects of withdrawal were starting to kick in. As she walked through the park, her heightened sense of paranoia made her see objects that weren’t there and hear people talking to her who didn’t exist.
In the distance was a wood. She recognised it as a place where she used to play as a child, a ‘happy place’, as her therapist would call it. Running towards it, she remembered an old disused caravan that had been abandoned long ago. It had previously belonged to the owner of a house on the edge of the wood who’d used it as a sort of ‘man cave’, where he could go to escape the wife. It must still be there, she thought to herself, as she gingerly climbed over a stile. No-one ever went in it when they used to play near there, so it was doubtful that anyone would know about it now.
As she ran farther into the increasingly dense oaks and beech trees, the moonlight illuminating her way diminished, and she stumbled more frequently over roots and fallen logs. But just before she lost the light altogether, she reached the small clearing where the caravan was. It was small, with a single door in the middle of one pale green oval side. Each of the small windows had been smashed long ago and a square of hardboard covered the opening. Instead of a door handle, there was now a shackle with a rusty-looking padlock, more of a token gesture than any sort of actual security. She gave the lock a few yanks, but despite its age, it wouldn’t budge, and the corners dug into her hand. Scrabbling around on the floor, she picked up a cricket-ball-sized rock and smashed it against the lock. The sharp metal cut into her hand as she hammered in desperation, until eventually the whole latch gave way and the door swung open.
A small ray of moonlight broke through the shredded paisley curtain that once covered the rear window, illuminating the small space enough for her to work out where the bed was. She might have been sharing the caravan with any number of small, rabid critters, but neither that nor the overpowering musk that hung in the air mattered.
The mattress was cold, but it was dry, and she had no hesitation in making it her bed for tonight. As she lay on it, the shivering began, along with the cold sweats. She pulled a dusty blanket from the bottom of the bed up over her and rested her head on her arm. This small, rusty tin can was the safest she had felt in weeks. Its physical strength was insignificant against its isolation; there was no way she would be found here.
As she lay down, her head thumped and the room spun around her. She closed her eyes and her mind began to drift back to the house from which she had escaped. It was so full of painful memories – but she was free of it now. Sadness filled her heart, at the fact that, despite her best attempts, she had been forced to leave the other girl in the clutches of those monsters. A small window of opportunity had presented itself, and she thanked her stars that, from somewhere deep within her soul, a survival instinct had kicked in and afforded her the clarity to act decisively. In a strange twist of fate, the well-groomed man with the smart clothes who had gained and then utterly abused her trust had helped her escape the hell that he’d dragged her down into.
She had looked him square in the eye, peering through the crack in the door. Having heard the commotion that had just happened, she’d hoped it would be safe to leave the bedroom once she heard the front door slam. As the two men lay bleeding on the floor, she ventured into the room, trying to clear her head. The cuts and bruises on her face were nothing compared to the pain that she felt in her stomach and back.
Limping across the floor, she surveyed the scene. She drew strength from seeing her captors lying semi-conscious and bleeding. The bigger man was groaning on the floor. With a rush of adrenaline, and as the pain subsided, she kicked him, hard. She kicked him again and again and again, each kick making her feeling more powerful.
Once satisfied that he was incapacitated, she moved over to the smaller man. He was the one who made her do things. Things that made her hate herself. She stood over him; he looked pathetic, like a spoilt child crying because someone had stolen his sweets. Before she could react, his eyes opened wide and he reached out to grab her ankle. Stumbling backwards, she shrieked as she fell against the coffee table and a bolt of pain shot through her back. He pulled her by the leg, reaching out with his other hand, trying to catch her flailing ankle. Daisy had shouted at him to stop, kicking for all she was worth, but he kept grabbing at her. He pulled her by the leg and she slid off the table onto the floor. Now he had her in both hands and dragged her closer to him, switching his grasp to her arms. He pinned them to her sides, holding her face a few inches from his own, blood and saliva dripping from his mouth.
‘You stupid little piece of shit,’ he spat. ‘You will pay for this.’
As her mind spun, she instinctively leant forward and bit Aleksander as hard as she could on the nose. He gritted his teeth, trying to resist, but it became too much and he let her go. As he grabbed his face, she crawled backwards to try and escape. Frantically looking around, she spied the small penknife, used to cut the drugs, sitting on the coffee table behind her. Reaching back with one arm she picked it up and plunged it as deep as she could into the top of his thigh. He screamed in pain as she pulled it back out. Before he could grab the wound, she plunged it into the other leg. This time, she gave it a twist before removing it.
‘Fuck you, arsehole,’ she whispered.
The writhing blood-stained mass of Aleksander grasped his legs to try and ease the pain, as blood continued to run from the wounds left by Saeed’s beating. Dragging herself to her feet, she hunted around the debris in the room, keeping one eye firmly on the two men lying on the floor. In a drawer, she found a small folded pile of twenty pound notes. Taking it, she went back into the bedroom and pulled some relatively clean clothes from a drawer. She struggled to dress herself, the mixture of panic and pain making her lose control of all her limbs. There were some shoes in the wardrobe, which she put on as quickly as possible before she made for the door.
Holding tight to the banister, she crept down the stairs, keeping an ear out for any noise coming from the bedroom. As she walked past the lounge, she looked in to see the other girl lying half-naked and semi-unconscious on the sofa. She ran in and knelt down beside her. Rubbing her shoulders, she whispered to the girl, trying to rouse her, but it was no good. The girl let out a soft groan as Daisy tried to pull her to her feet. The girl wasn’t heavy, but Daisy had nothing like the strength needed to lift her.
‘Come on,’ she said, with urgency. ‘We can escape, but you need to wake up and get moving.’
But all the other girl could muster was more groans, and she fought to make Daisy let go.
‘Get off.’
‘If you want all this to stop, we have to go now!’
‘No,’ she mumbled, turning her body away. ‘He loves me.’
‘He doesn’t. He’s just using you. Come on!’
Daisy tried one more time to roll her back over and pick her up, but was met with more resistance.
Suddenly, the quiet was broken as a gun fired from upstairs, shattering the coffee table in a shower of glass. The shock sent Daisy reeling backwards onto the floor, and she scrabbled towards the wall. Another shot rang out, kicking up a cloud of foam and dust as it hit the side of the sofa. She edged around the door frame and peered up the stairs. On the landing, Aleksander’s bloodied hand grasped the bottom of the banister, pulling his broken body around to the top of the stairs. In his other hand was a gun.
He groaned with the effort of each pull, until he was facing directly into the lounge door. Daisy knew she needed to run now; she had no choice but to leave the girl. Waiting until she heard him pulling himself along, she ran out into the corridor. Aleksander raised the gun, aiming as best he could through blood-encrusted eyelids.
‘Stop!’ he shouted.
Daisy froze at the bottom of the stairs and put her hands in the air.
‘You stupid little bitch, I’ve got you now,’ he said, straining to get the words out as she turned slowly to face him up the stairs.
They locked eyes, and Daisy’s breathing became heavy as sweat ran down her face. Time slowed down, tunnel vision engulfing her sight.
‘Bye bye!’ he said, mockingly, squeezing the trigger. Click! He squeezed again. Click! And again and again.
Daisy felt a wave of instant relief and side-stepped through the kitchen door. She leant back out into the hallway, smiled, and stuck her middle finger up at Aleksander.
‘Fuck you!’
‘No!’ he shouted, smashing the pistol repeatedly on the floor as the anger exploded from him. ‘Get back here!’
But she was gone, out through the side door and into the back garden. At the end of the garden was a gate which led to a back alley running along the railway lines. As the pain in her body eased, she made her way as quickly as she could, in any direction that was away from the house. A couple of hundred yards and she would be in the town centre, where there were people and shops, a place to blend in and disappear.