Hope's Vengeance (35 page)

Both had already automatically reached for their badges, and they displayed them in front of the evening receptionist, whose smile waned slowly into an inquisitive pout. “Police. Could you please tell us which room Griffin Hall is staying in?”

Julie’s expression was one of efficiency as her square nail traced along the guest-book, a glossy French manicure. She shrugged and smiled her fake smile. “We have no Mr Hall staying here tonight, I’m afraid. Sorry I couldn’t be any more help.” She closed the book, dismissing the detectives with her actions.

Claudia stepped forward and leant closer. “We haven’t finished yet. Can you see if an Eva Brunel is booked in?”

Julie let out a long, harassed sigh, retrieving the book from its home with exaggerated movements. She huffed as she opened it once more. “What name was that?”

“Eva Brunel.”

“No, I’m sorry,” the false smile had returned, “but we have no Eva Brunel booked in tonight either.” Her tone moved from light to sarcastic. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

Claudia, handsome rather than pretty, hated bimbos, and her patience was wearing thin. She held an intolerant hand out. “Just give me the book, we’ll look ourselves.”

Tipped head. Smile. Fluttered lashes. “I’m sorry, but it’s not hotel policy…”

“Give me the fucking book, Barbie!”

With a look of contempt Julie passed the book over the counter, and Claudia took it to a nearby coffee table, and, followed by Krein, sat on the oversized sofa beside it. “Nice PR, Claud!”

She chuckled. “Piss off, Dave!” Together they found the relevant pages and began to scan, scrutinizing each name unlike the flippant Julie who had appeared to speed read. “Fuck me!” Claudia had brought her hand to her mouth, and Krein looked at his colleague, curious. “I haven’t found Hall or Brunel, but bizarrely I have found Hope Brown.”

“Who is?”

“It’s like I told you in the car, Griffin has been accused by two women of sexual assault when they were children. Eva’s one of them, and Hope Brown is the other. I don’t know what’s going on here, but it’s getting pretty fishy.”

“What room is it?”

She focused on the book again. “One twenty.”

Krein stood, straightening his jacket. “Let’s go and investigate.”

But when they reached the room they were surprised that all they found were two constables with cans of beer in their hands, and guilty, worried faces. The ensuing few minutes found them updated on Dawn’s frantic call to the emergency services, how her brother had told her that Griffin Hall was handcuffed prisoner in a room, that Hope Brown had flipped, and that Rick Faraday was scared for his life.

Krein stated the obvious. “I don’t care if we have to disturb every guest staying at this hotel, but we’ve got to find whatever room Griffin’s booked into. Now!”

Dismissing first the receptionist’s, followed by the hotel manager’s outrage, they began the search with room one.

Room Sixty Nine

Rick was pacing the room, the display before him too sick to watch. Every bone in his body wanted to rush to the door, get the hell out of the nightmare, but Hope had the gun in her hand, and even though her back was turned to him as she emptied the tablets into a pile on the bedside cabinet, he wasn’t sure he could take the risk.

He stopped, surveying the hideous scene. Griffin lat on the bed, tears of pain running into his hairline, slashed on his legs, arms, torso, groin. The only places that didn’t ooze blood were his face and neck. Hope took a glass, and, stepping into the bathroom, she filled it with cold water. Back at the bed she removed the gag with a warning not to scream, and she took a handful of the mixed tablets, forcing them into Griffin’s mouth, tipping water to encourage him to swallow. He fought the urge, forcing his to retch, but the instinct was too strong, and at least half the tablets were washed down. Another spillage of water and the majority were gone, the bitter taste on his tongue forcing his face to screw up with distaste.

Rick, now desperate to escape, had been slowly edging towards the door for painfully long minutes, and eventually he needed to take just one more step and his hand would be able to reach the handle, he could get away from the vitriolic scene. Gathering more tablets, Hope didn’t turn to look at him. “It’s locked.”

Rick jumped to the handle, tugging and pulling, but the door stayed firmly closed. “For God’s sake, Hope, let me out, you don’t need me here, I’m not part of this.”

Leaning over Griffin, Hope dropped a handful into his mouth, following them with water. “But you are. You fucked my daughter. Did you think she wouldn’t tell me? That she’d keep your filthy secret. Well, now you know, me and Penny, we’re closer than that.” More water spilled into Griffin’s mouth, and the second handful of tablets cleared his throat.

Rick grabbed the handle again, tugging the door with every bit of strength he had, and Hope’s tinkling laughter seemed sinister now, taunting him, terrifying him. He glanced back in desperation and stilled instantly: she was holding the gun with both hands, the barrel aimed at him, and she’d cocked the trigger. “Come here.” Heart sinking fast, Rick obeyed, and he made no struggle when she calmly untied the makeshift noose and wrapped it around his wrists behind his back, tying it securely.

She scooped the last of the tablets in her hand and dosed her now compliant prisoner. Rick debated whether to try and talk reason into her or not, and the only way he could see forward was to tell the truth. “Penny told me she was sixteen.”

“I know.”

“She looked, in fact she looked older. She said it wasn’t her first time and she wasn’t making it hard for me. I had no idea, Hope, if I had I’d never have gone there.”

“Liar!” Hope was strolling towards the mini bar.

“No, God’s honour, she was twelve for fucks sake. It makes me sick to think of it.”

Pouring a gin into her glass, mixing it with tonic, Hope glared back at her ex-partner. “I know. But I also know that you begged her not to use a condom on you. How fucking irresponsible is that? She wasn’t using contraception, you want to be grateful she didn’t get pregnant!”

Rick’s head dropped forward, he loved Hope, wanted to spend the rest of his life with her, and now he knew how much she’d been hurting. “When I saw you in the crowd at the gig, you were the only one there, you shone out, and I knew straight away you were the woman I wanted to marry. I still do. I can’t take back the past, but I can promise you a good future.”

On the bed, Griffin breathed heavily, his head lolled onto the side, and Hope glanced over him. “He’s passed out. I thought he’d be sick, I always was.”

Rick snorted with irony. “You can’t hang him anyway unless you untie me, and I doubt you’re about to do that!”

“Hope, I swear, if I’d known Penny was your daughter I’d never have come on to you, not until I’d explained things to you.”

Hope slid down the wall, sitting beside Rick, and tugging her knees up to her chest. She rested her head on her legs. “Do your think he’s going to die?”

“Do you care?”

“I’ll get done for murder.”

“It’d be manslaughter, you have good grounds, and you can claim diminished responsibility because of your depression.”

“I don’t care what you call it, I’ll still be locked away.”

“Then make it look like suicide. He’s a child molester, he’s about to get sprung, so he took his own life. Simple.”

Hope dragged herself to standing and leant over the bed, she slipped the disposable glove onto her hand, and lifted Griffin’s arm, gripping his wrist for a pulse. She dropped it. “Slow and weak.” She sat heavily on the bed, hands loosely on her legs. “I thought it would feel good, you know, cathartic, I thought I’d find the bit of me that was missing finally. But no. It doesn’t make me feel better. I don’t feel anything at all, like a void, a nothing.”

Rick nodded to his fellow hostage. “You’ve done him, you’re finished with him. Come on, untie me, we can put this behind us and move on together. Please. You’ve done what you came to do, what you needed to do to free yourself from his memory. Now let it go, we’ll get married, we’ll have the baby, whatever you want.”

“There is no baby, Rick. I was sick earlier because the thought of having a baby with the guy who stole my child’s virginity at twelve revolted me, but I couldn’t tell you that at the time.”

He rested his head on hers, feeling the love she desperately didn’t want him to know about, his own adoration filtering through her self-preserving barriers. “Then we get married, we have a baby, we live however you want. You can keep writing if you want, or I can support you with Reveal’s advance and royalties, whatever you want.”

Gullible, ever hopeful, ever naïve, Hope slowly bent down and began to untie the rope.

Room Forty

Krein and Claudia moved onto the door across the corridor, room forty, and knocked firmly. Presently a woman, clothed only in a towel, straight blonde hair hanging limp and damp over her shoulders, opened it, curious. Both detectives held out their badges for her to see, and Claudia began the same spiel they’d repeated to all the guests who’d opened the door to them. “Detective Inspector Claudia Horseferry, and my colleague Detective Superintendent Krein. We’re looking for three people: Griffin Hall, Eva Brunel, and Hope Brown. Could you tell me if you’ve seen any of them please?”

The woman shook her head. “No, sorry.”

They sighed. “Thanks.” Claudia remembered as the woman closed the door, and they walked a few steps to the next room. “Only another eighty one to go!”

Rick and Hope

They were packing the last of their belongings into their suitcases when Rick turned unexpectedly, cuddling Hope tight to his chest. She sighed, relieved they’d managed to salvage the relationship, she knew she still loved him, and, rationally, it must have been a terrible secret for him to keep. He must have thought she’d dump him if she knew the truth, well, she had initially, and Penny had admitted how provocative she’d been with him. “You could have run off when I untied you back there. Why didn’t you?”

“I can’t help it, Hope, I love you so much. Anyway, now you’ve tied me up once,” he pushed her back, a playful glint in his eye, “you’ll have to do it more often!”

She chuckled, folding the lid of her case down and zipping it round. “Let’s get back home.”

As they left the room the phone sprang to life. Rick and Hope glanced at each other, questioning each other whether to answer or not. With a shrug, Hope made her decision and dragged her suitcase along the plush carpet towards the lift. Rick closed the door and followed her. Travelling downstairs, both checking their appearances in the mirrored walls, neither noticed the muffled shrill of Hope’s mobile phone, vibrating and ringing within the silencing clothes.

Charity Panics

Charity slammed the phone down, her frustration vented on anything in her way. Behind her the blood-curdling scream rang out again, and she couldn’t stand it any longer. “Will you just shut that bloody noise up, Penny, you’re having a baby, not a hippo-bloody-otomus!”

Penny was half-sitting, half-lying on the sofa, a tarpaulin, muddy side up, separating her from the quality upholstery, and the water spillage from her womb pooled around her hips. Fear raging from her tearful eyes, she couldn’t contain the scream as the contraction gripped her tight, squeezing her, racking her body with pain. “I want my Mum.”

“Jesus Penny, I told you! I can’t bloody get hold of her, she’s not answering the hotel phone or her mobile. Look Penny, we have got to get you to hospital. From the ridiculous racket you’re making I’d say you’re about to give birth any minute.”

And suddenly Charity realised how right she was as clear signs of the transitional stage of labour raged from Penny’s lips. “I don’t fucking care, I don’t fucking care, and I’ll fucking scream if I fucking want to. I’m not going anywhere without my fucking mother.”

Panic rising, along with the red colouring to her face brought on by stress, Charity snatched the phone and dialled emergency services. “Ambulance, please.”

In the background, yet screamed loud enough to be clearly heard down the phone line. “I don’t want a fucking ambulance. I want my fucking mother.”

“Hello, yes, it’s my niece, she’s having a baby on my sofa, and it’s a Cantoni, cost over five thousand, and we only got it just before Christmas. If there’s any stains I’ll… Oh, yes. My name’s Charity Rowbotham, the address is Brahms House, Waylaid Road, that’s in Tunstall… yes, I P twelve, three J U.” Behind Penny was groaning up another scream, the contractions severe and productive. Charity glanced round, flustered and scared. “Good God, woman! Surely you can hear her, she’s almost there. She’s only thirteen, I’d kill my Ava if she got pregnant at… sorry, yes, I said she was thirteen. Thank God for that, and make sure they hurry, because there’s no way I’m delivering a baby.”

Slamming the receiver down, Charity turned to Penny. “The ambulance is on its way.”

“I don’t want a fucking ambulance, I want my fucking mother. Oh, my god, not another one already, not another one, I can’t stand this any more.” Penny scrambled to standing, the searing pain in her lower back the worst yet. Dropping to her knees instinctively, animal intuition taking over, she leant forward, outstretched arms supporting her, gravity pulling the pressure away from her aching spine. As she began the next guttural roar, the ending scream piercing Charity’s ears with its crispness, her nail-bitten hands grasped the tarpaulin, white knuckles displaying her pain to the world.

Eventually she could breathe easily again. “I need my Mum, I can’t do this without my Mum, please get her Aunt Charity, please!”

To order, Charity picked up the handset again, nervous, fumbling fingers pressing out the number of the hotel, unaware that Bern and Olive had sneaked into the room, scared by the noise their sister kept making. They stood nervously, watching her, her dignity long gone, panting on all fours. “What are you doing, Penny?” Bern was too young to understand where babies really came from, he’d been told before but had dismissed it, preferring to play with his trains.