by Adam Carter
“Oh.” She’d not thought of that coming in, but it did make a certain kind of sense now. “Guess I didn’t think. And hey, who you calling a whore?”
Arcady shook his head in wonderment. “Absolutely unbelievable. I’m sorry about your brother, Sharon, but just light a candle and keep quiet.”
He went to turn his back on her again and she spoke before he could block her out completely. “What are you here for? You never said.”
“No. I didn’t.”
“Maybe I can pray for you?” She offered a small smile, not placing any deception in the gesture. It was surprisingly heartfelt for Foster. Even if it was a lie.
Arcady did not answer for several moments. Then he probably decided that a little praying on his family’s behalf couldn’t go astray. “My family was murdered.”
“Jeez, I’m sorry.”
He raised his eyebrows. “So you did find another way to blaspheme after all?”
“Sorry. What happened?”
“I don’t know. Someone killed them.”
“Do you know who?”
“No. The police are looking into it.” There was a strange light to his eyes then and Foster pressed him.
“You don’t sound too confident,” she said.
“I don’t think the police have a clue.” He paused, as though deciding whether to say something, and said it anyway. “I was visited by a detective today. She’s become the prime suspect in the enquiry by the looks of things. Police are running around chasing their own instead of trying to catch the real killer.”
“I’m sure they’re doing their best.”
“It’s so ridiculous,” he said, and she could see genuine tears forming in his eyes. “I’ve just got off a murder rap, OK? My wife stuck by me through that, knowing I was guilty. She stuck by me, hoping I would be found innocent, and everything worked out grand for us. I was going to get my life back together, take the family away, far away. I had the money, I just wanted to get my family away from all the stigma.”
“And then someone killed them. Bummer.”
“I should have been there. I should have been there when they were killed, I never should have left them.”
“Why did you?” She could see he was becoming frantic now and some of the people in the church were starting to stare.
“Eric. He went off on one when I told him I was going to take the family and run. He should have understood, I needed to get away. But he threatened to tell Stacey, threatened to tell my wife. I had to go see him, I had to calm him down, do you understand? Stacey stuck by me knowing I was a murderer, but if she found out about Eric it would all be over.” He shook his head, fighting back the tears in a losing battle. “But it doesn’t really matter now, does it? None of it matters any more.”
Foster blinked, her mind fitting all the pieces together. “You were having an affair with Eric?”
“What?”
“But you live with him now. He’s looking after you, right?”
“Where else could I go?”
Foster closed her eyes. “Oh my God.”
“Look, I really must protest about your ...”
“You threw a girl out of a window, pal, you seriously don’t get to judge me. Did it ever occur to you that Eric knew you were coming over to see him? That maybe he found a way to keep you in the area? Maybe to get you running back into his arms?”
Arcady’s mouth froze open as his mind processed what she was saying. “Eric?” he finally said.
Foster was on her feet. “If the courts worked, you’d’ve been sent down for murder and your family would now still be alive. So my advice to you, pal, is light a candle, sit in silent prayer; then go home via a bridge and take a long hard look at the water. It might be inviting enough for a swim.”
She stormed out of the church, not waiting for his reaction. There were enough people in the church for the police to get a conviction out of him now anyway. He had pretty much shouted out he was guilty of the murder, so maybe they’d get a result out of this after all. Right now she desperately wanted to go see this Eric guy. There was a chance he wasn’t the one who had murdered the Arcady family, of course, but if the two men met up often it might have been when Arnold Arcady was out walking his dogs, which would explain why they had not reacted adversely to Eric’s presence at the house.
She practically slammed the door of the car when she got in, grabbing her make-up bag to tear the mascara from her face. She was just pulling her top off to change into something more civil when she realised Thompson wasn’t in the car. She had likely gone out for some food for them, which was good considering Foster didn’t especially want to talk to her about this. She realised Lin was staring at her through the driver’s mirror.
“Anything?” Lin asked.
“He didn’t do it. Eric Hodgson. They were having an affair and Hodgson killed them. Or hired someone to do it, anyway.”
“Oh Lord.”
It was an odd reaction. “What?”
“Jen got bored, said she was going to talk to Hodgson.”
“What? Why?”
“Because she can’t just sit there doing nothing and because her gunshot wound was itching.” Lin pulled out from the kerb so quickly it slammed Foster into the back of the seat. Still struggling with her blouse change, Foster wished Lin would slow down. After all, Eric knew Thompson was a detective, Arcady had probably told him. He wouldn’t do anything to her, especially since Thompson had no idea he was involved. But then Arcady would also have told him Thompson was the prime suspect and wasn’t a part of the actual investigation. If Hodgson killed her in self-defence he could present the body to the cops and by the gunshot wound alone they would confirm she was the woman at the house.
“Christ on a bike,” she muttered as they quickly left the church behind.
CHAPTER EIGHT
She had been raised in the army but had never fought for them. Thompson had lost faith with the army once her father had disowned her, yet she could not help but think if she had seen some actual combat, if she had served her country properly, she might not have allowed this guy to get the drop on her. Presently she was bound to a chair, a rope encircling her legs and another her chest. It pulled tightly against her shoulder wound, although aside from a grimace she would allow herself to show no pain or discomfort.
Her meeting with Eric Hodgson had started off well. She had gone to see him at his house and he had invited her in warmly. Then he had clocked her over the head with a blunt instrument and while she was dazed he had tied her up. Her initial thought was that he intended to rape her, although bound in the fashion she was that hardly seemed likely. As her head began to clear she started to understand some of what was going on. Hodgson wasn’t insane, that would have been too easy an answer, which meant he was the man responsible for the death of the Arcadys. Why he would have done it was not immediately obvious, although love was one of the usual causes for murder and she guessed he was having an affair with Stacey Arcady. The affair had ended badly when her husband had been found not guilty and she had tried to end it. Hodgson had therefore killed her and her children. Killing the children was a bit much though, there was no real reason for it. And Thompson had to remember there was no attempt to rape Stacey before she had been killed. Surely if they had been having an affair Hodgson would have insisted on one last horizontal dance before he stabbed her to death.
Keeping love in mind, she had to assume Hodgson was having an affair with Arnold, which meant the murders only made sense if Arnold wasn’t aware of them. Which was pretty lousy for Arnold, but Thompson wasn’t sure she cared all that much considering he was himself a murderer.
She watched Hodgson busy himself around the room for a while. He kept disappearing, made a few phone calls she failed to properly listen in on, before she finally saw he had packed a bag and left it in the hallway. He was running, which made no sense, so she assumed it was a contingency plan.
Then she remembered the most interesting piece of all of
this; it had been she who had been found at the house and shot. Hodgson must have thought it was Christmas when she came knocking at his door when Arcady wasn’t in.
“So you’re going to kill me to conceal your murder of your boyfriend’s family,” she said deadpan. Nor did she ask it as a question.
He paused, glanced at her in confusion. He had not spoken to her since he had bound her; not laughed at her, nor boasted to her, and the silent stare was disconcerting.
“Well you’re a damn good detective, I’ll give you that,” he said at last.
“My colleagues know you did it, Eric.”
“No they don’t. If they did, they would have been here by now. You’ve figured it out since I bashed you. You’re a clever girl, Detective.”
“Yeah. Just a tad slow.”
“Still, intelligence deserves a quick, clean death.”
“If you’re going to give my body to the police, don’t you think they might notice the rope burns?”
He crouched before her and she could see the complete absence of emotion in his face. This man was a sociopath; that was why he had proved able to dispatch the Arcady family so easily. All he cared about were his own ends, and damn everyone else. “I wasn’t going to kill you,” he said with a sigh. “I was going to call the police and tell them I’d caught you. That you’d killed the Arcadys and then come for me. I’d caught you and they were welcome to come collect.”
“Oh.”
“Now it looks like I’m going to have to go to plan B and kill you anyway.”
“Why’d you pack your bags, then? That doesn’t make sense if you were calling the police.”
“They’re not my things, dear. I didn’t just go to the house to kill the Arcadys. There were some things I wanted, things ...” he rumpled his face as he spoke, “she had which should have been mine. I wanted them, so I took them. But if the police are going to come here, if I’m actually going to invite them here, I’d be an idiot to keep them in the house.”
“Oh.” Thompson felt slightly foolish now. Of course, keeping her mouth shut would not have saved her, since she still would have been arrested, but at least she would have been alive when the police came for her.
“I was going to take them out and then return for you, but since you’re going to die I don’t need to get them out of the house at all. The problem now is what to do with your body. As you say, the police will know I’ve tied you up.” He sighed. “Ah well, poor Arnold.”
“Poor Arnold?”
“He lives here too, yes? He found you, tied you up, beat you and killed you. He knew you killed his family and he got his revenge.”
“You’d frame your lover?”
He shrugged. “Love is transient. I think Arnold proved that when he told me he was leaving me for ...” again with the rumpled nose, “her.”
“Ah. You’re a ... real swell guy, Eric.”
It was said that in WetFish they dealt with the very worst humanity had to offer, and Thompson would offer no argument from her end. If the Arcady killings had been about love she would almost have found that sweet, if of course they hadn’t also involved the slaughter of children. But this wasn’t about love, it was about control. Arnold had chosen his wife over Hodgson and that was something Hodgson could not take. He wasn’t second best, and anyone who crossed him needed to be punished. He was a classical bully, and Thompson found she despised him in that instant more than anyone else she had ever encountered in her life.
“It doesn’t really matter how you die,” he told her, “but I wouldn’t want to get blood on the carpet. There’d be DNA evidence and everything after all.”
He departed the room then and Thompson struggled with her bonds, but they were pulled tight and she could make no leeway with them at all. Hodgson returned within the span of a minute and she saw he was carrying a pillow. Her eyes widened and she struggled harder, all to no avail.
“It’s from Arnold’s side,” Hodgson explained. “Fitting, considering he’s the one who’ll be blamed for your murder.”
Thompson tried to head-butt him, using the only weapon she had access to, but Hodgson was strong and shoved the pillow into her face so her head only connected with the softness. She shook the chair from side to side and felt it tumble, a dull shudder thrusting through her body as her back struck the floor through the back of the chair. But still could she not move her legs sufficiently to free herself and the world was still dark from the pillow. Hodgson held it tight, wrapping it about her face, and Thompson fought with her chin to move the thing, but nothing was working. Her heart was racing, she had not even thought to take a breath before he had come upon her, and her mind was beginning to shut down already from lack of oxygen. She knew if she allowed herself to fall unconscious she would die, but her struggles were availing her naught. But Thompson had struggled her entire life and she was not about to stop now.
A dull throbbing entered her brain then and she felt her heartbeat slowing. Her mind was drifting still, but she forced herself to stay awake. She gasped for air, although nothing entered her lungs, and she began hyperventilating in an effort to get more oxygen into her system. But it did not work and her body began to go into shock at what was happening.
An intense buzzing filled her mind and suddenly the pillow was removed and Thompson gasped for air, her senses swimming in a translucent haze as she fought to regain reality. The doorbell sounded again and Hodgson snapped his eyes towards it like a murderous meerkat. With a final disdainful look in her direction, he moved back into the hall to see who it was.
Even half-dead Thompson knew this was her only chance at escape and while her mind was busy recovering her fingers were at work. The jolt as she had struck the floor may not have loosened her bonds, but it had cracked one of the chair legs and she could feel it bending under her weight. Pushing down with as much pressure as she humanly could, Thompson felt the thing snap, and her fingers grasped the knife tucked into her boot. Twisting the blade, she sawed through the rope binding her waist. Cutting through rope was never a swift process, but whoever was at the door was clearly keeping Hodgson busy, and she felt a rush of relief as the rope finally gave way and she was able to move her arms.
Bringing the knife around, Thompson intended to cut through the rope binding her legs, but a commotion occurred in the hallway and she watched as two women were marched into the room with their hands above their heads.
“This is the worst rescue ever,” Foster hissed at Lin, who seemed to very much agree.
Hodgson appeared behind them, hurrying them into the room with a kitchen knife. Thompson did not allow him the chance to notice she was free and hurled her own weapon with all the training of Corporal Daniel Stewart behind it. Hodgson gave a startled choke as the knife struck him in the chest and he collapsed against the wall.
“Terrible rescue,” Thompson said, managing to slip her limbs out of the binding now that one of the chair legs had broken. Foster and Lin stared at her in disbelief. “But a decent distraction.” She noticed Hodgson was gurgling blood even as he clawed uselessly at the knife embedded in his chest. He tried to say something, but Thompson didn’t much care what it was.
“Now what do we do?” Foster asked.
“We use his own methods against him,” Thompson said as she crouched beside Hodgson. “He intended to frame Arcady for my murder, so we frame Arcady for his. Maybe Arcady got wind that Eric here was the one who killed his family, and took matters into his own hands. There are plenty of people out there willing to believe Arcady capable of murder, after all.”
“Yeah,” Foster said, “but what do we ...”
Her voice was cut off in a strangled gasp as Thompson withdrew the knife from the man’s chest. It was sticky with blood and did not want to come free, enjoying the warm place in which it had suddenly found itself. Thompson heard the blade scrape against bone as she slowly pulled it out, and Hodgson began wailing, although the blood bubbling in his mouth caused it to come out a wheezy gargle.
/> Thompson smiled down at him and placed the tip of the knife against his windpipe. “Just for your lack of intelligence,” she told him, “I’m going to do you slowly.” And keeping eye contact with him she gradually pushed the knife through his throat. Hodgson squirmed, tried to move, tried to shout, but there was nothing he could do. His eyes widened and blood pooled in his mouth. His fingers tore uselessly at her clothes, but Thompson ignored him. Within a span of twenty seconds her knife had passed in to the hilt and Hodgson’s bloody fingers dropped uselessly from her jacket, his eyes wide and fearful and lifeless.
Thompson cleaned her knife on his clothes and rose. She noted the horrified expressions of her colleagues and the fact Foster was about to vomit. “What?” she asked.
Lin shook her head. “Let’s get out of here.”
Thompson frowned as they moved for the hall. “Seriously, what?”
*
The bunker was quiet, and the DCI called them into his office as soon as they returned. Edward Sanders was a man in his middle years, stern of appearance and canny in character. None of the women present knew why he had summoned them, for it was standard practice for them to file reports on their assignments, not to deliver them in person.
He sat there calmly observing them for some time, leaning back in his chair, elbows upon the arm rests, fingers steepled. Eventually he said, “I sent a doctor to the train yard. You decided to run away?”
The women cast nervous glances between them but it was Lin who spoke. “We ... wanted to get away from the area.”
“Me or the doctor?”
“Sir?”
“You didn’t trust one of us. So was it me or the doctor?”
They all averted their gaze. It told Sanders precisely what he needed to know. Inwardly he was not happy, although he should have figured he would be vilified eventually by his officers. He had always tried to do his best for them, for the city, for everyone. He was tough and ruthless, true, but he wasn’t about to leave his officers to die. “You’re not the first operatives to screw up an assignment,” he told them seriously.