Chapter Nineteen
A Jagged Edge
Marc got up and stepped carefully away from the body. He was in shock but had enough awareness to know he was walking all over a crime scene. Too late to do anything about the contamination he’d already caused, but he could reduce any further impact. He rose onto his toes and attempted to retrace his steps backwards through the sodden grass. He didn’t want to look at Tyrone’s face again. It was an image that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
He looked around. On the opposite side of the park from the river, he saw someone. A man in a dark padded jacket, walking a dog on a leash.
“Help,” he yelled. Then louder, “Help, please.”
The man didn’t even look in his direction. Shit . He was probably wearing ear-pods. Marc waved his arms above his head, desperate to attract the man’s attention. He realised his urgency—he didn’t want to be alone out here with a dead body—then he was immediately struck by guilt. What an awful thing to even think. A young man had lost his life. That’s what he should be concerned about.
He dialled the emergency services. “Police,” he hollered when the operator answered. “There’s a body by the side of the river Bly.” His voice was remarkably calm, given how badly his limbs trembled. He gave clear directions to where he was. The operator asked him to return to the body to check for signs of life.
“He’s dead,” Marc said. “I’m sure of it. His chest is all cut up. There is no life in his face.”
Regardless, the call handler insisted that he check for a pulse.
Marc’s feet became heavier with every step he took back. He closed his eyes as he drew aside the branch that covered Tyrone’s body. His breath rasped through his teeth. He forced himself to look. Not at the man’s slackened features, but at his hands.
Marc reached for his wrist.
Tyrone’s skin was cool, but not completely cold. Whatever had happened to him, it hadn’t been too long ago. Whoever had done this must have run through the park. If they had returned along the river, he would have seen them. Marc steadied himself and pressed his fingers to the radial point. All he could hear was his own blood in his ears. He concentrated harder, applied more pressure.
There was nothing. No pulse.
“I’m sorry,” he gasped into the phone. “But’s he’s dead. There’s nothing I can do to bring him back.”
* * * *
Jason slid the box of tissues across the desk to his client .
Laura Moses was showing remarkable restraint, given the news she’d just received. She pulled a tissue, dabbed her eyes and gently patted her nose. “Thanks,” she said, returning her hands to a careful position on top of her thighs. He never knew how cases like this would play out, but whenever he was hired by someone to find out whether their spouse was cheating on them, there was never a happy ending.
“How long has it been going on?” she asked.
“As far as I’ve been able to establish, about four years.”
“Bastard,” she said bitterly.
Laura had only begun to suspect her husband Ken’s infidelity in the last twelve months. He’d obviously been a lot better at concealing his affair prior to that. Which meant one of two things. He’d got so comfortable in the deception, he’d become sloppy. Or he no longer cared about keeping it a secret.
She was a very attractive woman in her mid-fifties, with clear skin and thick auburn hair. Jason had seen her husband many times in the last four months, and even if he’d been much better looking when he was younger, he would still have been punching far above his weight when he married her.
Laura stared at him. “That’s not everything, is it? I can see it on your face.”
There was no way to sweeten this pill. He turned on his tablet, opened the photo app and slid it across to her. The woman in the picture was much younger than Laura or her husband. So far, so clichéd—balding and rotund middle-aged man with a much younger mistress. It was a textbook crisis for a certain kind of man over fifty. There were two children in the photo with the woman. A girl of around seven, and a boy .
“The girl is from a previous relationship,” Jason said.
Laura looked closely at the photo. She gave an audible swallow. “How old is the boy?”
“Twenty-one months.”
She let out a long, low exhalation. “That bastard.” The sadness in her voice had been replaced with cold anger. “Any chance it could be another man’s kid?”
“It’s impossible to know without a paternity test, but…”
She glanced at the image again. “But the kid is the double of his fucking dad.”
Jason didn’t have to answer that. It was obvious.
“Does she know about me?” Laura asked.
Jason swiped to another photo. This one showed Ken and his girlfriend enjoying an alfresco lunch in the marina at Nyemouth, along the coast. “Her name is Michelle,” he continued. “She’s a probation officer.” He zoomed in on the picture, closer and closer until Ken’s right hand filled the screen. His fingers were bare. “He takes off his wedding ring when he sees her. She thinks he works offshore on the oil rigs, which is how he gets away with not seeing her for weeks at a time.”
“And he tells me he’s working away when he’s with her.”
Men like Ken were deplorable, but in a twisted way Jason had a degree of admiration for them. The planning, the deception, the sheer ability to remember the lies they told, had to take a staggering amount of effort.
He opened his desk and took out a large folder. “Prints of all the photographs are in here, together with my report on the times I followed him. I’ll email digital copies too. It’s up to you what you do with them. ”
She bared here teeth. “I want to stuff them down his fucking throat.”
“Well, I can always get more prints if you do, but my advice would be to take them to a lawyer first. As far as I can establish, he has no idea that you’re on to him. You might as well utilise that advantage and get in ahead of him.”
She nodded, slowly. “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
Laura thanked him for all his work and gathered herself together. She left the office around quarter to six. Olivia had already gone, and he was surprised to find Ryman’s office had been closed up too. He must have made plans with his daughters. It was the only reason he ever left early.
Jason stretched and winced at the pain in his chest. He was overdue a dose of painkillers. He got a glass of water from the dispenser and returned to his office to swallow two capsules. It had been a long but rewarding afternoon. Since accepting Marc’s case, his other clients had taken a back seat. It had been a gratifying experience to catch up with some of them again, even though the updates he had provided hadn’t been the best news for everyone. At least Laura knew what a deceitful piece of shit she was married to. Jason hoped she took him for all he was worth in the divorce.
He realised the time. Getting on for six o’clock. Marc had been due to meet Tyrone at four. His phone was in the top drawer of his desk. He always shut it away and put it on to silent when he was in a meeting.
There were seven missed calls.
Shit .
They were all from Marc .
Jason ignored the voicemails and called Marc’s number straight away. When he answered there was a lot of background noise. People talking, sirens, traffic.
“What’s going on?” he asked. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Marc said. “Well, no, not really. But I’m fine. I’m not hurt. Did you get my messages?”
“No, I just finished with a client a few minutes ago. I called you straight back. What’s the matter? Did you meet Tyrone?”
“Tyrone is dead. I found him by the river. He’d been stabbed. Just like Dan.”
The world seemed to collapse beneath Jason’s feet, like the floor had fallen away. He grabbed the edge of the desk. “Are you all right? Tell me, honestly. How are you?”
“I’m fine. I’m shaken, that’s all. Fuck, Jason what is going on? Who the hell is doing this? Two of the boys we’ve spoken to in the last week are dead.”
“Where are you? Are you safe?”
“Yes, there’s a million police officers around. I’ve given a brief statement already, but they need to speak to me again in more detail.”
“Where exactly are you?”
“I’m in the carpark at the concert hall. I found him on the path along the river. They can’t get their vehicles down there so they’re coordinating everything from here.”
Thank God, he’s safe . “I’m coming now. I’ll be about fifteen minutes. Whatever you do, stay with the police. Don’t go wandering on your own.”
“There’s no chance of that. Right now, they’re treating me like a suspect. I’ve got an officer watching me like a hawk. ”
“That’s good. Don’t let them leave you, okay. I’ll be with you soon.”
Jason pulled on his overcoat. Fuck . This was escalating rapidly. His instincts were right. Two men had been murdered, and someone had tried to kill Marc and himself. Theo’s death was far bigger than any hit-and-run. Someone was trying to shut the investigation down, permanently.
He grabbed his keys and hurried for the door, turning out the lights in his room. He should be able to get a cab from the rank along the street. With a bit of luck, he would be with Marc even sooner than he’d promised.
Ryman’s office was in darkness and Olivia had shut down her computer on the reception desk. The kitchen lights were still on. He switched them off and checked the toilets to make sure no one was still in there. He was sure he was alone in the building, but it wasn’t unknown for strangers to wander in off the street and use their bathroom. It was a matter of routine to check them before leaving each evening.
All clear.
As he hurried towards the top of the stairs, he froze, sensing he was not alone.
There was a figure on the staircase, halfway up. They were dressed entirely in black. There was a hood over their head and their face was concealed behind a black ski-mask.
“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.
The figure in black raised their right hand, revealing the jagged-edged blade of a hunting knife.
Jason considered his options in the fraction of a second. Another day, he could have taken them easily. He had the advantage of being above. A well-placed kick would send the stranger tumbling down the stairs. But with a sprained ankle and a broken rib, this was not an ordinary day. Could he really put up a fight, when a single punch to the ribs would incapacitate him?
The figure in black climbed the stairs.
Jason had no option but to retreat.
He stumbled backwards. Pain lanced through his leg as he put sudden weight on the injured ankle. He fought through it, making for the kitchen. His mind was already ahead of him, trying to work out what he would find in there that could be used as a weapon. There was nothing more dangerous in the cutlery drawer than a handful of forks and some butter knives. Useless compared to the hunting knife his pursuer wielded.
The same knife that had cut up Dan Blumel and Tyrone Lucas? Almost certainly.
Jason was determined that the blade would not be the end of him.
He heard the killer’s footsteps at the top of the stairs.
Jason stumbled through the gloomy kitchen. The only source of light came from the landing. He yanked opened a cupboard.
The silhouette of the killer filled the doorway. Jason reached into the cupboard. All he found was a pile of plates. Better than nothing. He flung the first plate like a Frisbee, putting substantial force behind the throw. It missed the stranger by a foot, shattering against the wall. The debris clattered to the floor. Jason already had his hand on the second plate—he adjusted his aim and took another shot.
The killer was faster. They ducked and the plate sailed over their head and through the open door. Before he could grab another plate, they were racing across the room towards him.
With a cry of rage, he swatted them as they came at him, landing a blow to their shoulder, but lacking the force required to do any damage. The killer drew back their arm and plunged the knife towards him.
A flare of lethal steel.
Jason jumped and rolled. He felt a rush of air as the blade just missed his arm. The pain in his chest was excruciating as he spun across the floor. Powering through, he staggered to his feet and rushed back the way he’d come. He snatched the handle and yanked the door shut behind him. It wouldn’t lock but the delay to his hunter would buy him valuable seconds.
Rushing past Olivia’s desk, he grabbed her chair and hurled it behind him. The castors rattled across the floor, crashing into the kitchen door just as his pursuer pulled it open. Jason kept moving. To glance around could be a disaster.
The adrenaline surging through him took the edge off his pain and he made it to the top of the stairs. He gripped the handrail and hurried down, two and three steps at a time.
Something heavy struck his back on the right side, sending a fresh surge of agony through him. He yelled in pain as the object banged down the stairs ahead of him. It was Olivia’s laptop. There were footsteps behind him. Jason kept moving.
The killer had closed the front door when they came in.
Without a key, he knew it couldn’t be locked. It could only be on the latch .
He reached the bottom and raced across the hall, already reaching for the lock, anticipating what he needed to do.
Then the instinct and intuition he’d learnt to rely on in the Navy kicked in. The killer was right behind him.
Jason spun and flattened his back against the wall.
His pursuer came too fast, and momentum carried them forward. They ran into the front door before spinning around, coming at him again with the knife raised.
At the last second, he ducked into a rugby position, ramming his good shoulder into their middle. Then he levered upwards, throwing them over his back, to land in a heap at the foot of the stairs.
The manoeuvre took him to the edge of complete agony. He had nothing left in him to keep up the fight. He had to get away before they got to their feet again. If they came at him with the knife, this time they would succeed in tearing him apart.
He grabbed the lock and twisted it off the latch. Racing outside, he pulled it shut behind him.
He scrambled in his pocket for the keys. He would lock the bastard in.
Too late. The latch clicked again and the door began to open.
Jason hurried out of the way.
The coffee shop next door was still open. There were a dozen or so customers inside, as well as staff.
As he staggered through the door, gasping in pain, struggling to catch a breath, most of the people stopped what they were doing and stared at him in astonishment.
“Police,” he panted. “Call the police. ”
The killer was right outside. For a moment, their eyes locked through the window.
They can’t be mad enough to follow me in .
A second seemed to drag for eternity.
Jason was not at all certain he was safe. This bastard was crazed enough for anything.
The spell broke. The figure in black stuffed the knife into their jacket and turned, fleeing in the direction of the bus station.
Jason collapsed in a heap as relief, pain and exhaustion overwhelmed him.