Okay, on my way.
She is about to set her phone down on the passenger seat, when the screen lights up again.
See you soon.
*
Lydia keeps an eye on her satnav as she traverses the treacherous, snow-covered country roads to Harkem House, way out past the north edge of Decanten. The stereo is playing her Christmas gift, an attempt to keep nerves at bay and stay positive about the twin tasks at hand.
A pothole jerks the vehicle with a sharp shudder, and Lydia’s slender fingers grip the wheel tightly as she fights to keep control. The snow is starting to fall heavily again, heavy clouds gathering and blocking out the sun’s rays. She flicks on her headlights, and in their yellow-orange glow a sign looms up ahead. ‘CAUTION: DEEP WATERS’.
Lydia scans her surroundings, confused. There’s no water here. The James River is miles to the south and the Chesapeake Bay to the east. Then she comes upon another sign. ‘TRAVELLER’S BRIDGE’.
“Traveller’s Bridge…” Lydia says out loud, a flicker of recognition in her voice. This is where Jason’s brother Finley fell to his death. The hairs covering every inch of Lydia’s skin prickle as though charged by an electric current. Another coincidence? She doesn’t like this at all. Jason’s words float into her head. “My death will trigger a chain of events that nobody will be able to stop.”
Lydia considers turning back, or pulling over and calling Alex, but before she can make up her mind, she is on the bridge itself. Dark grey concrete, slick with ice that makes her wheels slip as she peers over a low wall to the fast-flowing river below, chunks of snow and ice swirling in its powerful currents. No child could survive that. She feels sick.
Over the bridge and into the woods. Densely packed trees seem to close in, shuffling towards the winding road, reaching their twisting branches overhead to block out the sun. High above in their branches, dozens of pairs of eyes peer down, resident ravens taking note of everything that happens in their domain.
Suddenly they are gone. Lydia’s little red car bursts free of the claustrophobic woods and into a clearing of flat fields that stretch on for miles. At their centre, a single red-brick building bathed in the eerie blue glow of the rising moon. As she gets closer, Lydia can make out the sharp, pointed roofs above large windows that peer at her like giant, haunted eyes. The house looks old, but not in any noticeable state of disrepair. Pulling up in the driveway, Lydia sees Alex’s car parked right by the door. It is the only one here. Where are the other police? Where are the investigators? What is going on?
She parks her car next to his, and flinches when the porch light flicks on as she approaches the front door. Just a sensor, she tells herself. The wooden slats on the porch creak like grinding teeth. She raises her hand to knock, and then hesitates. Nobody lives here. Why are you knocking? Instead she reaches for the handle and pushes gently. The door swings open.
“Alex?” she says uncertainly as she steps inside. The entrance hall is dark, the only light coming from somewhere up the stairs straight ahead. Lydia reaches for the light switch, but its soft clunk is accompanied by no illumination. Lydia takes out her phone and calls Alex. No answer. She tries again, listening hard this time for a ringing somewhere in the building. But there is none. This isn’t right; the voice chews her mind ever more frantically. Every fibre of her being is telling her to get out of there, to run, to drive back to town, go straight to the police station and tell them everything. But Alex’s car is here. What will he think if she abandons him now?
Using her phone as a torch, Lydia presses on into the front room. The air in here is thick, and still, and suffocating. The décor a nightmarish corruption of homely. A grand piano takes up around a third of the room, opposite a majestic fireplace scattered with twee ornaments. Perched on an ornate, upholstered wooden chair, a handmade doll stares straight ahead with button eyes. Lydia’s eyes travel over the many stitches crisscrossing its face like scar tissue. Without taking her eyes off it, she crosses to the piano and sits down on the stool. A framed photograph atop the giant instrument features the entire Devere family. They’re not all smiling in this one. Adam looks stern, Lydia thinks. Serious. Evelyn is so young and vibrant, full of life. Young Jason is unmistakable; Lydia would know that sneer anywhere. Then there is Finley. The same pale blue eyes as his brother, lighter hair maybe, and a wicked smile that is like Jason’s but not like it at the same time. There is something… unsettling about it. Lydia stares at the picture, trying to put her finger on it.
She sets the photograph down and lifts the piano lid, laying her slender fingers on the cool, ivory keys. She hasn’t played since she was a little girl, but some things just stick in your memory. Softly, gently, Lydia begins to play a simple lullaby, one that her mother had played for her when she was just a little girl. At first the melody is comforting, almost warming the room as snow falls outside the window. The house begins to feel like a home. But then the notes begin to slip out of tune and the sound becomes chaotic, menacing, like nails on a chalkboard.
Lydia snatches her fingers from the keys just as the creak of a floorboard overhead almost makes her topple backwards off the stool.
“Alex?” she calls out, warily. No answer. She reaches out to close the piano lid, when a thin ray of moonlight spilling in through the window hits her ruby ring, causing it to blaze blood red in the darkness. A memory comes flooding back to her, of Jason in Mortem Asylum, a similar effect flaring about his hands only pale blue like his eyes. The locket. On a curious hunch, Lydia reaches into her bag, pulls out the box and flips it open. Sure enough, the diamonds and sapphires sparkle obligingly up at her. She fishes it out, turns it over in her hands, then digs a nail into the groove and prizes it open.
Inside she finds a tightly-folded scrap of paper. Fingers trembling, she unfolds it and begins to read by the eerie blue light of her phone.
Dear Lydia,
I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you this before, but events must unfold as they are meant to do. In a few moments I will be dead, so now is the time to call in that favour you promised.
Firstly, and please believe that I am truly sorry about this, but your life is in danger. I had hoped to avoid this, but unfortunately we have both run out of time. I am not a good man, it is true. I am a drug addict, a thief and a liar. But I am not a murderer. The man the world knows as the Krimson Killer is still alive.
You have heard that my brother fell from a bridge where we played as children. This is not true. I was the one who fell. Finley pushed me. He knew what he was doing. He had always been a troubled child, pulling the wings off insects and hurting other children when they played with him. But that day was when we realised that he was truly broken.
Miraculously, I survived my fall with a few small broken bones. My mother nursed me at home so as not to arouse any suspicion at a hospital. My father yelled at us both for being so stupid – I had never seen him so furious before. Days later he committed suicide by drinking bleach. It was made to look like suicide, but my mother and I knew the truth. Finley murdered him. I wanted to tell the police, but mom was terrified of losing her son on top of losing her husband, so we buried my father in the yard and never spoke of it again. We had to protect Finley and his ‘disappearance’ from being found in any investigations that may have taken place around the house.
‘Family is family’ my mother used to say. She became paranoid that the world would discover what my brother was and take him away from her, so she faked his death, forcing me to lie to the police about him falling off the bridge. They searched for months, but Finley was locked in our attic the whole time. Mom hoped that he would grow out of his madness, that it was just a phase, but I knew that wasn’t the case. Nevertheless, I still loved him as a brother and would keep him company when I could, telling him stories about my adventures at school, smoking and drinking with him in the attic.
But Finley resented being locked up. He started breaking out during the night and going hunting in the woods, bringing back dead
animals and leaving them in the kitchen. He never said why. My mother began to lose her mind worrying about him.
Soon enough, I got myself that girlfriend I told you about, Anna, when I was eighteen. I was so happy, happier than I ever had been, but then Finley threatened to ‘get rid of her’ if I spent any more time with her. I don’t know if he was jealous or bored, but I couldn’t let that happen. So, I did what I had to do and broke it off with Anna, for her own sake. I let her go and live her life. Doing that broke me I must admit, and, it was a shame; I did genuinely like her.
As time went on, we saw the stories on the news about the Krimson Killer, and I knew at once who it was. I searched the attic while he was out one night and found the crude calling cards he made, marked with a K just like on TV. I didn’t know what the letter meant to him. I still don’t.
Again I wanted to tell the police, but my mother’s tears prevented it. I wasn’t strong enough to break her heart, even though it would have been the right thing to do. For a while we pretended it wasn’t real, but then Finn got caught on a security camera, and the police pinned it on me. We did look alike. My mother made me promise not to tell, not to let them take him away, she told me he wouldn’t be strong enough, mentally, to survive imprisonment. What I never told her is that Finn threatened to harm our mother if I didn’t take the fall. So I kept quiet and let them pin all of his crimes on me. I became the Krimson Killer. Doomed to die for my brother’s sins. I could at least do this one thing for my mother: protect her.
But now she is dead, I have no more promises to keep. I am certain that Finley killed her when he realised that you were on to him. Being locked up in the attic all those years has made him terrified of jail beyond all rational thought. He will come after you, and anyone else he sees as a threat, in order to prevent that from happening. You must be ready when he makes his move.
Finley is sadistic and cruel. You saw the crime scenes. He will play with you for his amusement. He will want you to run. He needs the chase. He needs to smell your fear. That is his nature. Do not give him what he wants. Do not show him what or who you care about. Use his nature, his desperation against him. I’m sure you will figure out how.
I wish I could have righted these wrongs while I was alive, but now that burden falls to you. You must stop my brother before he kills again.
One last thing Lydia. I know that you made a promise to my mother to clear my name. As hard as I know this will be, I am asking you to break it. The stain on her character if people found out that she hid a murderer in her house all that time would be unbearable. I don’t want that. Please let that secret die with us. I have already died a murderer. Let me remain that way. It is no less than I deserve. I could have stopped this, but didn’t. Their blood is on my hands.
Good luck, Lydia Tune. I really did like you.
Your friend,
Jason Devere
Lydia stares down at the piece of paper, her mouth open. Every word scrawled upon it has drained another ounce of strength, and now every inch of her body feels numb. She has been fooled. They all have.
With a stab of horror, Lydia remembers the creak of the floorboard directly above her. Very slowly, she raises her head and looks up.
“Alex…” she whispers.
Suddenly everything in the room feels like a threat. Every shadow, every dark corner could be harbouring danger. Lydia catches sight of the doll staring right at her with its sewn-on eyes and her skin crawls. She is shaking so hard that she drops her phone, causing it to cast light chaotically around the room, making inanimate objects shift and glint. She cries out, crouching and fumbling to pick it up again. She needs to get out of there, but even though her car is just outside, right now it feels a million miles away.
Another thump on the floor above makes Lydia jump to her feet. Heart pounding so hard and fast she feels like she might pass out any second, bitter adrenaline in the back of her throat making her mouth water. She lunges for an iron poker propped up near the fireplace and spins around, waving it towards the door. Silence. She hesitates, options racing through her mind. Stay here and wait for whoever it is to come to her, or make a dash for the car.
Courage overcomes fear and Lydia bolts into the hall, practically falling upon the front door and wrenching at its brass handle with trembling fingers. But the door doesn’t open. It’s locked. Lydia pulls with all of her might, fumbling desperately for a key, or a bolt, or something. But there is nothing.
Behind her, a stair creaks. With a cry of fear, head down and without looking in the direction of the noise, Lydia sprints back into the living room, scanning its dark walls frantically for a door she knows is not there. The raggedy doll grins evilly at her. No escape, she hears its high, gleeful voice in her head.
A gap in the thick cloud drifting lazily in front of the full moon causes the windows to glow eerily, and suddenly another escape route presents itself. Lydia snatches up the poker again, smashing the creepy doll and sending it flying across the room. Then she grabs the chair and hurls it at the nearest pane of glass which shatters with a loud crash, and a cascade of fragile tinkling as the broken shards tumble to the floor. A blast of cold air rushes into the room, and Lydia throws herself towards the source of it, bending her knees ready to launch herself through the hole still surrounded by jagged glass. But as she does so, a strong arm around her waist holds her back, lifting her effortlessly off the ground. Lydia screams, kicking her legs and flailing her arms wildly as a hand presses a soft rag over her nose and mouth. The sting of chemicals is harsh, and sickening. The room spins, everything a blur, and she feels herself falling. As her ragdoll body hits the ground, the last thing she sees is a wild figure looming over her. Then the darkness takes her.
Forty-One
The Perfect Crime
Lydia’s dreams have been coming thick and fast lately. Dreams about the past, about choices she has made to disown her abusive father, to pursue the career that has made her so famous. Different situations, but a common theme. In every dream, she chooses loneliness over heartbreak. Every night she must make the decisions all over again, and every night she struggles to understand how things could have gone any other way. She was right, wasn’t she? But then, why was she always so sad?
With great effort, she forces her heavy eyes open. They feel dry and sore, as if she hasn’t used them in days, and for several long moments everything is a blur. She tries to rub them, but her hand refuses to move. Her feet, too. Then there is pain, heat, friction. She is bound with rope, upright, tied to a chair that creaks as she shifts and squirms. Her skin is burning up white hot, and she now sees herself dressed in a red sequin dress that sparkles in the dim lighting. Adjusting herself slightly, she can feel that her underwear is loose, unfastened. And there is pain inside too, stomach burning, womb screaming, waves of violation breaking over her again and again as her consciousness grows.
She blinks again and squints as her surroundings begin to come into focus. Bare, dusty floorboards strewn with crimson blankets. Wooden beams supporting a sharp, angled roof. Red and green fairy lights twisted around them, dangling like nooses, keeping the dark whispers lurking outside at bay. Paintings both hung and propped up against exposed brick walls. One in particular catches her attention: an image of two young boys with cheery smiles. The painting is exquisite, but their faces are eerie, haunted.
An eclectic selection of furniture dotted around the room. A baroque chair here, a Victorian lamp there, mismatched companions hoarded over many years. And a desk. A large, heavy oak desk covered in photographs. Lydia cranes her neck to try to see them; twisted limbs, vacant faces, and blood. So much blood. Lydia starts to cry as she realises where she is.
“How do you like my work?” asks a chilling voice behind her. Lydia’s blood runs cold. How stupid she has been. How arrogant. How blind. She had wanted so badly to find the evil in Jason Devere that she had failed to see his humanity. Now evil had found her, its presence clear and unmistakable in just six words. She tries to
turn to face her captor, but her binds are too tight, her chair bolted to the floor. “Don’t bother,” says the voice. “You’re mine now.”
Just hours ago, Lydia had given Gretchen a lecture about hopelessness. Now, too late, she truly understands what it means. She will die here. Nothing can save her now. She hears footsteps on the wooden floor, and sees movement out of the corner of her eye, then Finley Devere steps around in front of her. The happy little boy from the photographs, now stretched and twisted. An embodiment of pure wickedness.
“I hear you’re something of a connoisseur,” says Finley, his hollow voice completely devoid of emotion, of humanity. “I’ve read all of your books. Tell me,” he bends down, his voice quieting, “how do you think I measure up?”
“Please…” Lydia whimpers, refusing to meet his chilling gaze, “let me go.”
“Really?” Finley sounds disappointed. “That’s the best you can do? The famous Lydia Tune, mistress of the mind?” He snorts. “You disappoint me.”
“I’m n-not going to insult you with… with m-mind games,” Lydia stammers, her body shivering as though fevered. “I know what you’ve done. What you’re capable of.”
Finley swoops down on her, his mouth barely an inch from Lydia’s ear, icy breath making the hairs on the back of her neck prickle violently. “You don’t know anything.”
Lydia closes her eyes. This is it. No point fighting. Be brave.
“I know that you’re a monster,” she says, her voice hard, forcing herself to turn and face him.
Face of Evil Page 23