by Ed James
Terry grinned back. ‘We’ll make a soldier out of you yet, Jock.’
The other lads laughed along.
Jokes about his Scottishness rankled anywhere. Hunter couldn’t help but return fire. ‘Piss off, you Cockney bastard.’
‘That’s my girl. Keep flirting like that and you might get lucky after this mission.’ Terry lifted his rifle and aimed at the door. Battered wood, barely hanging there. Looked old enough to have been around when they wrote the Bible. He thumped the door with his boot. ‘Open up!’
No response.
Hunter’s nostrils twitched. Bacon. Someone was cooking bacon. He frowned at Terry. ‘Can you smell that?’
That pikey oik from Terry’s squad joined in the sniffing. Rat-faced arsehole. ‘Thought they didn’t eat pig here?’
‘Supposed to be dirty or something.’ Terry nodded, his eyes narrowing on the door. ‘Or was it sacred? I can’t bloody remember.’ He thumped the door again. ‘Open up!’
Nothing.
‘On my mark!’ Terry looked around them, one by one. ‘Hunter, you’re with me. Rich, Mike, you stand guard here. Nobody in or out. Capiche?’
A couple of nods. Hunter added his.
‘Now.’ Terry jolted forward and his size elevens crunched into the dark wood. The door flew off rusted hinges and toppled inwards. The bacon smell got worse, overpowering. Stinking the place out. A wave of heat burst out of the room, like they’d walked into a sauna and someone had poured a gallon of water on the coals.
Something clattered inside.
Terry bolted through the open doorway and came to a dead stop, his SA80 on something in the room. ‘You filthy bastard!’
Hunter stopped behind him. Almost lost his lunch rations.
A woman lay naked on a table, strapped in at the wrists and ankles. She twisted her face away from them.
‘Craig.’
A man in a cloak stood over her, holding a branding iron in a brazier. He held it out to them and hissed something in Arabic or Aramaic or Klingon for all Hunter could tell.
‘Craig.’
Then he pressed the brand into the woman’s face. Smelled like someone was frying bacon.
* * *
‘Craig!’ Chantal’s grip was red hot on Hunter’s forearm. ‘Are you okay?’
The image of McNeill was swimming in front of him, as she chewed her sandwich. At least one of the four images he saw of her was also scowling at him. The bacon smelled worse. Acrid, deep-fried, sharp. Like a brand into human flesh.
‘Sorry.’ Hunter shook himself as he stood. ‘Haven’t eaten all day.’ He flashed a smile at McNeill and stormed out of the office.
The woman screamed through her gag as—
Fat Jimmy waddled towards him, carrying a tray of Krispy Kreme donuts like it was the Ark of the Covenant. ‘See what I’ve got—’
‘Not now.’ Hunter barged past and jogged down the corridor. He swiped his card in the reader and pushed the door. Nothing.
The flesh started to sizzle and pop as—
Not now.
NOT BLOODY NOW!
He took a deep breath. The corridor smelled of coffee and whitener. No bacon.
He swiped again, slowly this time. Click.
He nudged the door and stepped out of the back entrance into the narrow lane. Blackened bricks on both sides, barely enough space for one person to walk down without slicing their arm open. Rain teemed down on his head. He looked up into the sky and shut his eyes. Scottish air filled his lungs, cold and crisp and tinged at the edges with a sharp note of petrol fumes.
Cigarette smoke.
Curry spices.
Chips.
He slowed his breathing, sucking breath in through his nostrils.
Ten.
Nine.
Eight.
Seven.
A hand caressed the back of his jacket, sliding up to his neck. ‘You okay?’
Hunter couldn’t open his eyes. He gulped in more air, tasting her perfume. Sweet and alpine and . . .
He opened his eyes and grimaced at her. ‘Another flashback.’
‘Oh.’ Chantal leaned back against the opposite wall. ‘Thought you were over them?’
‘Me too.’
She ran a hand through her hair, fanning it out. ‘The bacon triggered it, didn’t it?’
‘Maybe.’
‘I’m sorry, Craig. If I’d known—’ Her jaw twitched. ‘Look, I had a . . .’ She smiled. ‘I had a friend who had a smell trigger. Cigar smoke . . .’
‘Cigar smoke.’
‘Bit easier to deal with than bacon, I suppose.’
‘Look, it’s been years since I had a flashback like that. Years. It’s not like I go past a greasy spoon or into someone’s house and they’re frying bacon and it kicks me off to la-la land.’
‘This why you’re a vegetarian?’
‘Partly.’
She tilted her head. ‘You have been taking your meds, right?’
Hunter managed a nod. ‘Never miss a day.’ He huffed out air. Almost felt the Afghan heat shoot through the breeze blocks. The black Audi was on the street. ‘I’m thinking it’s Rollo-Smith.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Years ago.’ Hunter swallowed. ‘Back in Afghanistan, I had a run-in with one of those monkeys.’
Her smile twisted into a frown. ‘Monkeys? Are you serious? You’re going to use a racial slur in front of me?’
‘Christ, no.’ Hunter grabbed her arms. ‘That’s what we called the RMP. The military police.’
‘The monkeys?’
‘Right. So I thought this guy was investigating me, turned out it was someone who’d recently died on a mission. It was pretty stressful.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘Doubt you can, but those guys are brutal. They don’t give up.’
‘And this was in your flashback?’
‘Right.’ Hunter huffed out a sigh. ‘I was back in Iraq. With . . .’ He swallowed. ‘Terry and a couple of others. We were supposed to find this . . . cleric, I think he was. The intel said he was training suicide bombers. But we stumbled on his location. Turned out he was also in the habit of torturing and branding women.’
Her eyes bulged, mouth widened. ‘I’m not having a go, but why haven’t you told me about this before?’
‘Because I blocked it out.’ Hunter dug his knuckles into his eye sockets. ‘This was before Terry, you know . . .’ His mouth was dry as the Iraq air. ‘That guy escaped. We found him later, dressed up in the full hijab, burqa thing. We chased him and . . .’
He opened his eyes again just in time to see her brows jolt up. ‘And then he . . .?’
‘Then he blew himself and Terry up, aye.’
‘Christ.’
‘Aye.’ Hunter sighed. ‘Or maybe it’s because this guy is a Captain. Those pricks in charge. They really dropped a clanger, you know? Sending us out on that mission was grossly irresponsible.’ He rested against the door, arms folded. ‘DI McNeill going tonto at me in there didn’t exactly help either.’
Chantal leaned on the wall. ‘Sharon’s under so much pressure. The new Chief Constable wants results, not convictions falling apart before they get to court.’
‘Lies, damned lies and statistics. Worst of the three.’ Hunter ran his hands over his shaved scalp. The rasp took him closer to his safe place. ‘But we got that stoat last year. He’s inside.’
‘That’s one case, Craig. And that was based on your investigation, not a team effort that would silence the CC and his calls for more efficient use of our resources.’ Chantal pinched her cheek. ‘Look, there’s the careerist shit, like Shaz needing our investigations to come to something. We need to stop witnesses dropping off the face of the earth when they’re due in court.’ She stared down the lane to the thin sliver of car park, brushing damp hair out of her eyes. ‘But there’s a much bigger reason why any of us are in this unit, right? We want to get these degenerates off the street. We want to put these raping, abusing scumbags
away.’
‘Couldn’t agree more. Even Elvis has that saving grace. Even fat Jim.’
‘Right.’
‘I know what you’re getting at, though. This isn’t about just some guy getting away. This is Sean Tulloch, a serial abuser . . . The damage he inflicts. Again and again. It’ll never stop, until we catch him and pin a ton of evidence on him to make sure he can’t squirm out of a life sentence.’
‘Right. Glad to see your head’s back on the case. So, this army guy. Rollo-Smith . . . Why do people have to have those double barrel surnames? What happens to the next generation? Rollo-Smith-Ponsonby-Smythe?’
Hunter barked out a laugh. Then he rubbed his face, trying to scrape the last fragments of the memory away. ‘Chantal, we can’t trust him. That thing I just said about pinning him under a mountain of evidence . . . Once we’ve got enough of it, they army will pounce and get Tulloch on a court martial before we can even arrest him.’
‘So what? The scumbag still goes away. Why’s that bad?’
‘Because Rollo-Smith will try to cover it over. Trouble with them is . . .’ Hunter cleared his throat. ‘See if we arrested an American with child porn on his laptop over here, we’d send him back to the States because he’d get a much longer sentence there. Right?’
‘I suppose.’
‘Well, the RMP aren’t necessarily interested in justice the same way most investigators are. They’ve got an agenda. At least they did when I could’ve used some due process.’
Chantal shook her head at him, her forehead knotting. ‘You need to—’
Her Airwave blasted out, the sound shrill in the confined space.
She put it to her ear with a sigh. ‘Go on, Constable.’ She nodded along then jogged off towards the car park. ‘Stay with her!’
Hunter sped off after her. ‘What’s happened?’
Chantal zapped the pool car and hauled the door open. ‘Paisley Sanderson’s been assaulted.’
SEVEN
Chantal
Chantal stomped down the corridor, her flat soles not providing nearly enough noise to reflect her fury.
Another victim. Another woman lying there, battered and bruised at the hands of Sean Tulloch. While they . . . messed about. Trying to catch him at Waverley, while he waltzed in to her flat thirty-odd miles away and assaulted two police officers, then kicked the living shit out of her while . . .
While he did what?
I don’t even want to think about it.
Chantal swerved past an orderly pushing an old man down the corridor. The poor soul looked inches away from death. She squeezed between the wheel and the wall, getting a scowl from the orderly, and powered off again.
‘Wait!’ Hunter grabbed her arm. ‘You need to calm down before you go in there.’
‘Craig . . .’ She glared at him, waiting until he let go. The wheelchair trundled past them. ‘I’m calm enough.’
‘Bullshit. You’re feeling guilty about it, aren’t you?’
‘Well done. You know how I think.’ She gave him a round of applause. ‘Now, do you mind?’ She turned the corner into the next room. ‘Through here, right?’
‘Stop!’ Dr Helen Yule caught one glance at them, groaned, then dragged the curtains shut behind her. ‘I should’ve guessed you’d both be involved in this.’ She held out her long arms, stopping them in their tracks, her stethoscope swaying from her neck. Her glasses obscured the missing half of her right eyebrow, yet couldn’t do much for the vertical scar bisecting it. ‘I can’t let you speak to Ms Sanderson.’
Chantal was almost out of breath with suppressed rage. A pair of nurses milled behind them, whispering to each other. ‘How is she?’
Yule checked her tablet computer. ‘Well, Ms Sanderson has been savagely beaten. No thanks to you. She’s been punched and kicked by someone a lot bigger than her.’ She clutched her tablet tight to her chest. ‘Did you have any idea this would happen?’
Chantal gave her a curt nod. ‘We had been notif—’
‘You knew her life was at risk.’ Yule’s gaze darted between them. ‘You should have stopped this!’
‘We had a team at her house to protect her.’
‘Fat lot of good that did.’ Yule stepped away from the curtains and swished another one open. ‘This is your idea of protection.’
A woman lay unconscious on the bed, two nurses milling around her. Chantal recognised her — the cop who turned up at Paisley’s flat to assist PC Warner.
‘PC Smith here has yet to regain consciousness.’ Yule tugged the curtain shut. ‘So you see why I’m reluctant to let you anywhere near Ms Sanderson.’
Chantal nodded at her. ‘We accept full responsibility for this.’ She stood her ground, hands on hips. ‘How is Paisley?’
‘Delirious. But she’s been talking, which is something. Saying she’s sorry, over and over.’ Yule’s tongue flashed across her lips. ‘Now, I assume that whoever did this to her is who she’s apologising to?’
Chantal gestured behind Yule at the curtains. ‘We need to speak to Ms Sanderson.’
‘Given the state of her injuries, I can’t sanction that. Especially after your actions when last we had the pleasure.’
‘Listen to me.’ Chantal’s nostrils flared wide. ‘We’re investigating Paisley’s partner in the context of a long series of domestic abuse incidents. Sean Tulloch. He’s done this before, four times now. She’s the fifth. If we don’t stop him now, he’ll do it again.’
Yule nibbled at her lip, looking genuinely torn. ‘Look, I can’t . . .’
‘Paisley is our only hope. The evidence we’ve collected from the others is . . . Well. Nobody’s willing to stand up in court. Paisley alone said she will.’
‘Look . . .’
Chantal stepped closer to Yule. ‘Tulloch remains at large. He will do this again.’
Yule stared at her for a few seconds, then gave Hunter the up and down. ‘Very well.’ She raised a finger. ‘But this is on the condition that I will terminate any discussion as soon as I deem it harmful to the patient.’
Chantal smiled at her. ‘Wouldn’t have it any other way.’
* * *
Paisley looked sore. Where she wasn’t bandaged, her skin was puffed up, red and dark purple. Dried blood mixed with dark-brown iodine on her forehead, multiple cuts. Her lips twitched, but formed no words.
Chantal perched on the chair next to her. ‘Hi, Paisley.’
She closed her good eye, her lips still twitching. ‘Sorry.’ Her voice was close to hissing. ‘Sorry. Sorry.’
‘Why are you apologising?’
‘Sorry, sorry, sorry.’
‘Paisley, who are you apologising to? Is it Sean?’
She seemed to come out of a trance, blinked and glowered at them. ‘This is your fault.’
‘What is?’
‘What do you think?’ Paisley waved her hands around her beaten face. ‘This!’
‘This is nobody’s fault but Sean Tulloch’s.’
‘It’s mine as much as yours for not protecting me. I should’ve protected myself. Should have kept my mouth shut. Shouldn’t have made him angry.’ Paisley stared down at her hands. Her right was a claw, seemingly unable to open or close. ‘I should’ve known . . .’
Chantal clenched her fists at her own powerlessness.
What have I just said? This isn’t her fault. The training — base and generic and empty. Reaching for platitudes when you need to connect with her. Show her you understand. Deeply. Personally. Not just as part of the job, but because you’re trying to fix her life. Trying to stop craven bastards abusing her and fellow victims.
Chantal shunted the chair closer to the bed. ‘You’re not the first woman he’s done this to, Paisley. You’re the fifth we know about.’
Tears streamed from her good eye. ‘So why haven’t you caught him yet?’ She punched a fist against her thigh. ‘Why?’
Hunter cleared his throat. ‘We’re trying to, Paisley, okay? It seems like Mr Tulloch knows that we’r
e talking to you.’
Paisley waved a hand at her face. ‘Has he done anything like this to the others?’
‘So it was Sean who attacked you?’
‘Of course it bloody was.’ She closed her good eye. ‘Who else?’
‘As far as we know, Mr Tulloch has only targeted you. Did he say anything when he attacked you?’
Paisley rolled her shoulder. Losing her . . .
‘I know how hard this is, okay? And I’m not just saying that.’ Chantal squeaked the chair forward. ‘How about you take us through what happened? In your own time? In your own words?’
Paisley sucked in a deep breath. ‘I was waiting on those cops of yours to turn up, right? Bored out of my skull cos you’ve got my phone.’ She let out a sigh. ‘Then that Irish cop — Lenny? — he hears something out the back, like when you turned up. So he went outside.’ She nibbled at her lips and rubbed a stream of tears away. ‘Must’ve got blindsided the same way your friend here did, same way all the useless people you get to protect me do, cos next thing I know, Sean’s in the house. The woman cop tried to hit him, but he . . .’ She scrunched up her face. ‘He knocked her out. One punch. Then, he’s grabbing my hair and asking who I was speaking to.’
‘What did you say?’
‘What do you think?’ Paisley shook her head. ‘I said I wasn’t talking to anyone but he started punching me, anyway. Over and over again.’
Chantal let a breath escape slowly. Every one of those punches, all the renewed suffering. My fault.
Hunter scribbled on his notebook. ‘What happened next?’
Paisley bunched her fists up tight. She’d clammed up again.
Chantal glared at Hunter, trying to shut him up. After a tactful pause she opted for a much softer tone. ‘Paisley, it’s very important that you tell us exactly what happened.’ Paisley’s sobs filled the gap. ‘He hit you a few times. Did he do anything else to you?’
‘He went for a shower.’
‘Immediately?’
‘Can you believe it? That prick left me on the floor like this.’ Paisley ran a hand down her battered body. ‘Tore all my clothes off and left me there while he had a bloody shower. Said this wasn’t finished.’