The Coop

  The Corsa didn’t explode and soon after a fire crew and two medics arrived to take over from Pauline.

  They were thirty-two minutes into the “golden hour” for trauma survival when Everton was winched up into an air ambulance as it hovered precariously above the rotor-battered tree tops. And the vital hour had come and gone by the time the chopper finally arrived at the John Radcliffe Trauma Unit in Oxford. The triage team were already working on Everton as they rushed the gurney from the car park landing zone and into A&E, where six medics lifted him onto an operating table and the critical battle to save his life began.

  It took four hours and five pints of blood to stabilise him. At 3.12am he was transferred to the intensive care unit on the first floor. His injuries included multiple blunt-force traumas to the head, including three missing teeth and sixteen stitches to his scalp; a fractured collarbone, left arm and wrist; a punctured lung; and a bruised spleen. Cannula and multiple large bore lines were inserted into his arm and connected to infusion pumps. He was attached to a ventilator and put into a pentobarbitone-induced coma to allow his body and brain time to recover from the massive trauma.

  The coop

  Kieron – or Nephilim as he called himself on the farm – was awoken before dawn by a cacophony of crowing as the alpha birds of the Battery engaged in their daily battle for supremacy. He hated the sound and looked forward to putting an end to it once and for all. He should have done so earlier but there was something about their stupid bravery that he admired. They protected their flock from threats at all costs, even at the expense of their own lives. On killing days, as the piles of dead hen birds grew, he saw them launch suicide attacks on his mother, and her laugh as she kicked them like feather footballs into the wire-mesh netting of the coop. But, battered and bleeding like him, they’d still come back for more.

  Even when she told him that she’d never loved him, that he was the “bastard progeny” of a hospital psychiatrist she was sectioned under, he never blamed her. He blamed himself. But it made no difference; she punished him for it all the same, banishing him to the coop. On his long nights alone with only the birds for company he learnt how to lie dead still and allow them to roost on him and keep him warm. It was a tiny symbiotic act of kindness and the only time in his life that he’d truly felt accepted – until Gina, his dove.

  His first act of real defiance was at the age of ten, when he tried to intervene to protect his favourite cockerel from his mother’s garrotte. She pushed him aside, grabbed the bird by its legs and clubbed him across the head with it until it was dead. She hadn’t said a word but later as she tended the gash on his face with TCP, she told him that he’d learnt his first lesson about the cost of love… and by the time he watched her dying slowly of stomach cancer, he’d become a master of it.

  Laura Fell seemed different though; she’d shown him respect and kindness and he was uneasy about abusing her trust, although he reasoned that it would only be a matter of time before she failed him. She’d already made advances, kissed him, showed him half-naked photos of herself whilst she was supposedly grieving. No, he was doing the right thing. But he had to be vigilant and control his craving. Nephilim could touch her but not purge her like the others. He wanted her conscious so she could experience first-hand his ultimate creation.

  Groaning against the ache in his back and arms, he hauled himself out of bed and stood shivering on the worn lino. The room was arctic and icy draughts whistled through the rotten window frames. He’d been forced to get up in the night and put on his mother’s old fleece dressing gown for warmth, but waking with the smell of her on his skin disgusted him, so he doused it and himself with talcum powder and made his way into the bathroom.

  For a moment he panicked, seeing Laura lying motionless in the bottom of the bath, thinking that she was dead. But then he saw the soft swell of her white belly rising and falling in time with her shallow breathing. She looked beautiful and would look even better when he’d finished with her. He pulled off his dressing gown, covered her with it, turned and walked out of the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind him.

  The chicken pit was an inferno. He was concerned that the smoke might be seen – he usually only burnt at night – but he had little choice but to get rid of the old installation to make room for his masterwork. He looked down into the pit, shielding his face against the furnace’s heat. Francis Cole was burning well, but Barbara Crane’s plumage had barely caught alight. He doused her again with petrol and stood back as she ignited into a fireball, intoning, “I am Nephilim… My spirit shall not abide in mortals… for they are flesh.”

  Rubbing the smoke and soot from his eyes, he trotted over to the mini-digger in preparation of refilling the pit.

  Soon his work was nearly done. He scrubbed the coop clean and placed Laura inside. He eased the tape from her mouth and placed a bottle of water – with a few added drops of Rohypnol – and four slices of gluten-free fruit loaf beside her in case she woke. Finally, he exited, locking both doors behind him, secure in the knowledge that there was no one to hear her or find her.

  He was standing at the kitchen sink, washing with some water that he’d boiled from the kettle, when he heard the news on Radio Jackie that a Met police officer had been found under suspicious circumstances in a crashed car near Stokenchurch. He smiled at a job well done and began to towel his face dry. Until he heard that Everton was still alive and had been airlifted to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford.

  “Fuck!” he exploded, gnawing at the back of his hand until he drew blood.

  DCI Teal was prowling Stokenchurch Gap watching the Fire Crew in the gulley below laboriously fix steel cables to the Corsa and winch it, inch by inch, up to the road. Above him, the morose clouds rumbled ominously, as if reflecting his mood.

  “It doesn’t make sense. There are no skid marks, nothing,” he called to Helen and Clarke as they trudged from the crash site back up the hill towards him.

  “He was drunk,” Clarke called back, pulling the collar of his donkey jacket up to shield him from the biting wind. “The medics reckon he stank of booze.”

  “He’d have still tried to brake,” retorted Helen, who was still in a state of shock after being woken by a terse 4am phone call from Teal.

  “He suffers from vertigo, maybe he blacked out?”

  “And maybe it was a suicide attempt?” said Teal, stopping the discussion mid-flow.

  “You're not serious, guv?”

  “Of course I’m not bloody serious! But I’m going to have to tell the press something and nothing I’ve heard so far makes any more sense,” he said, staring grimly down at the numerous evidence bags containing clippers, scissors, a razor, hair and a mobile; that were laid out on his car bonnet as if it were a car-boot sale. “Jesus. I can see the headlines now. ‘Second Met COP KILLER.”

  “There’s no way he murdered Laura Fell.”

  “She’s missing and his mobile’s full of naked photographs of her – bound and shaved,” snapped Clarke. “Christ, Helen, how much more proof do you need?”

  “In case you hadn’t noticed, he’s black. Our suspect is white.”

  “Keep it down,” whispered Teal, who was in no mood to referee a shouting match between two of his detectives whilst the greedy-eared members of the press were corralled behind a barrier barely fifty metres away.

  Clarke gave a disgruntled shrug and said, “Okay. But in my book, if it looks like shit and it smells like shit…”

  Teal shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his Crombie overcoat, fishing for the comfort of his peppermints as he mused out loud, “Maybe Bowe was trying to make it look like it was our killer?”

  “They could even have been working as a team, guv. Bowe was the first person to enter Gina Lewis’ house after her suicide; he could easily have taken her mobile and laptop.”

  Helen feared she was losing Teal to Clarke’s twisted logic and desperately needed to undermine his credibility. There was nothing else for it; she was forc
ed to come clean and reveal Everton’s information. “If he was in league with the killer, why would he give our two prime suspects an alibi?”

  “He didn’t,” Clarke said dismissively.

  “He did. He was the grass who told me Hart was robbing a bookmaker in Walthamstow at the time Tessa Hayes was attacked. And that Colin Gould was there too, stalking him.”

  “I was in the car when you got that call. You never said it was from Bowe.”

  “Because I didn't trust you! You’ve been leaking information about this enquiry from day one–”

  “DC Lake–”

  “It's the truth, guv, I can prove it–”

  “Oh, this is bullshit,” snorted Clarke. “Stop trying to protect him, Helen. Stop mixing up your professional and personal life. It doesn’t work.”

  “Really? It didn’t stop you sleeping with me, did it?”

  Clark reacted like he’d been slapped in the face and spluttered, “You’re a bloody liar.”

  “And you’re a lousy fuck! You want proof, guv, check Everton’s mobile. He showed me a video of the sergeant here secretly meeting an ex-cop called Brian Hoffman, who just happens to work as Celia Lewis’ head of security. That’s why you’ve been getting so much heat from above.”

  Teal fixed her with a look as dark as the overhead clouds and said, “I hope for your sake you can prove that.”

  “I can. It’s all there. In the mobile–”

  “Guv–”

  “No! Not another word, Jack. Not a word.” Teal pulled a pair of latex gloves from his pocket, deftly manoeuvred his huge hands inside and removed the mobile from the bag. Helen never took her eyes off Clarke, determined to savour the moment that the axe finally fell on him and his self-serving career.

  “There’s nothing here.” Teal held up the mobile, revealing the empty video folder. Helen felt physically sick, realising that Clarke must have deleted the incriminating video when he’d first found the mobile.

  “Sorry, Jack,” said Teal, offering his hand to Clarke. “I wouldn’t be doing my job if I hadn’t checked.”

  “Hey, no problem, guv.”

  “Okay. Get these bags over to the lab. I want a full DNA profile on any blood or hair they find, ASAP. And tell them not to assume it’s all from Laura Fell. I want to see if any of it matches Tessa Hayes.”

  Clarke nodded, collected the bags and made his way back over to his car. Helen watched him drive away.

  Clarke could see her through his rear-view mirror and waited until she was out of sight before dialling Brian Hoffman to give him the news that they were in the clear.

  Back on the hill, DCI Teal slipped another peppermint into his mouth and savoured the peppery heat before turning wearily to Helen. “For a woman with a first-class honours degree, you seriously fucked up – twice.”

  “It was there, I swear to God. Why would I ask you to look if it wasn’t?”

  “I have no idea. Who’s supposed to have shot this mystery video? Not Bowe himself?”

  “No. I think it was his wife. She’s a journalist.”

  “I know,” groaned Teal, remembering how she’d stitched him up after an interview two years previously. “Where is she now?”

  “On her way to the hospital. DC Coyle’s driving her and her son.”

  “Get in the car.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To the John Radcliffe Hospital – and I warn you, if Pauline Bowe doesn’t corroborate what you’re saying, you and your degree are going to be history.”

  Relaying the news of the accident had been bad enough, but having to explain the circumstances was a nightmare for Jerry Coyle. The young detective had been forced to field a barrage of awkward questions from Pauline Bowe on the journey from London. Questions that he didn’t have answers to, or if he did he wasn’t at liberty to divulge. To make matters worse, her son, Adam, broke down and sobbed. Coyle had tried his best to ignore it, but it was acutely embarrassing.

  He was relieved to finally arrive at the John Radcliffe, even if it took him four laps of the car park to find a space. He followed Pauline and Adam towards the reception, but as they entered the double doors she froze, seeing a crush of press and TV camera crews clustered to one side. A duo of Thames Valley cops was holding a press conference and it was clear from their taciturn replies to the questions that the story had already leaked. It felt like an out-of-body experience for Pauline. Her natural habitat had always been amongst the baying pack, but now she was isolated and felt vulnerable, knowing that if they saw her they’d attack. She covered her face, turned and walked quickly back out of the double doors.

  Coyle found another entrance into the building through A&E, avoiding the press. They made their way through the battlefield of the walking wounded, heads down, and out into the main wing of the hospital. Coyle checked the confusing floor plan on the wall beside the lifts and finally pressed two for the intensive care unit.

  As the lift doors gasped open, they were faced by another set of double doors leading to the ward. A sign below an orange bell on the wall read “Use antiseptic scrub” and “PRESS FOR ENTRY”. They followed the instructions and one side of the double doors clicked open.

  They walked into another world. The ward was like a set from a science-fiction movie. Eight identical beds, four on either side of the bare hangar-like room, contained patients, lying like statues, connected by various IV drips and feeding tubes to blinking monitors. Some were old, sunken-chested husks, whose parchment skin was bruised and punctured by catheters. Others were young; Adam had to avert his eyes as they passed the teenage victim of a hit-and-run accident, who’d had both her legs amputated below the knees. Accompanying the horror, like a movie soundtrack, was the constant low hum and harmonic beeps of the life-support machines. The ward’s heartbeat.

  “Excuse me. Can I help you?” offered the eager young sister, who’d materialized from behind the curtain of the only bay screened-off from the ward.

  “DC Coyle. I’m looking for Everton Bowe. This is his wife and son.”

  The nurse nodded, disappeared behind the curtain and immediately reappeared with a constable, who looked incongruously out of place in a mask, with a hospital gown over his uniform.

  “Hello. I’m PC Hope, Thames Valley Police.”

  “Is he alive?” The abruptness of the question took the young cop by surprise, especially since it came not from Pauline, but the intense-looking youth loitering behind her.

  “Yes. Uh, he’s critical but stable. Would you like me to get a doctor?”

  “And a strong cup of black coffee, no sugar,” added Pauline.

  “Let me do that,” said Coyle, eager for a break from what had been the longest two hours of his life.

  Pauline and Adam were gowned and masked-up and led into Everton’s cubicle by a no-nonsense IC nurse, who’d developed a habit of treating all visitors to the unit as if they were an encumbrance to her work.

  “Please do not touch him or any of the monitoring equipment,” she warned, as if it was a common occurrence.

  “How long has he been unconscious like this?”

  “He’s not unconscious. He’s in an induced coma. He’s quite stable.”

  “Stable?” replied Pauline, horrified by the state of Everton. “This is stable?”

  Everton heard the brittle female voice and something deep inside his limbic system, a somatic marker, stirred and awoke, allowing a memory to rise like a bubble to the surface of his brain.

  And it was at that precise moment that he knew he was still alive.

  The Real Bean Cafe was more McDonald’s than Costa Coffee but not priced accordingly. Even so, it was packed at 7.55am with staff refuelling after their night shifts and outpatients who’d arrived for their early clinics. DCI Teal and Helen were sitting with Pauline at a quiet corner table, watching Adam, who was morosely checking the meagre display of Danish pastries on the burnt-sienna counter. It was the first time Teal had spoken to Pauline since she wrote the damning articl
e about his failed burglary initiative and he felt obliged to clear the air before questioning her. Especially considering the circumstances.

  “Look, Mrs Bowe, I know we’ve had some issues in the past…”

  “Issues? I wrote an article which was the truth and you blamed my husband for setting you up. And then, despite the fact that you couldn’t prove he had, you penalized him for doing it anyway. Well, you want to know something, Inspector? He didn’t stitch you up. It was me. I did it. I used Everton to get to you and expose you and your inept department. He was actually appalled when he discovered what I’d done and begged me to shelve the interview. But I wouldn’t, because I’m a journalist and it’s my job.” She took a tissue from her handbag, blew her nose, tossed it onto the table and shrugged as if to say “so now you know”. “Actually, it was the thing that finally broke up our marriage. That and his blind, naive, faith in doing the right thing. And what did it get him, Inspector? You tell me?” She paused and waited for his response. But like all good coppers Teal knew when to stay silent.

  Helen unfortunately didn’t. “Pauline–”

  “Mrs Bowe.”

  “Look… I know this must have come as a terrible shock for you, but–”

  “For you as well. You and he are an item, aren’t you?”

  It was said without obvious malice but it stung like a nettle and Helen for all her bravado suddenly felt out of her depth. “That was a long time ago.”

  “Of course. I should have said ‘were’. You shagged him and dumped him, didn’t you? You know something, you’re worse than he is,” she said, nodding to the tight-lipped Teal. “You don’t care about anything but your career.”

  “Helen,” said Teal, placing a twenty-pound note onto the table. “Do you think you could get us all some coffee?”

  “I like mine black,” said Pauline.

  Teal ignored the barb and continued, “And I’ll have a bacon sandwich. I’m starving.”