My Heart Belongs To You: A Psycho Thriller (6 page)

More silence, just the sound of footsteps,
and whistling.
Tom closed his eyes and tried to engage his professional skills.
The footsteps were heavy, probably a man
;
a
big man.  He was no more than six feet behind them.
He
could hear
the man
breathing, low shallow breaths snatched between bars of a song
that
he couldn
’
t quite place.
  He was
wheeling something
. It
could be a tr
olley
.

Adam Black brought the trolley to a stop just six feet away from the large table on which the
couple was
securely strapped.
He knew they were secure
,
because he h
ad secured them last evening before pumping
them full of Diprivan, a drug used to induce anesthesia.
 
As he always did with the couples,
h
e
had stripped th
eir clothes from them
.
  He didn’t mind this part
, since
the woman was slim
and
beautiful with clear flawless skin. 
Some
six weeks before
, his
employer had selected them for coupling
,
as he called it
,
and told Adam to begin the preparations for their taking.
  He was good at this, he would follow them for weeks
, walking in their
shadows
to get a feel for the kind of people they were, their habits, if they had regular routines, the places they
liked
to go to eat, where they worked.  Adam was never quite sure how the selection was made and he knew that asking would not be wise.  His employer was not only a large
,
powerfully built man
,
but he had a temper that could flare in a nanosecond.  Add to
that,
what Adam had witnessed firsthand after the scalpels had done their work
,
and it gave weight to his decision not to ask questions.

‘
Tell us what
’
s happening
,
’
tried Tom again
,
struggling to keep the fear that
was gnawing at his
stomach
from
turning
his voice into a screech.

Adam ignored the man and placed the large black bag on the floor at the side of the trolley.  He knew how to place the items in order
and ready
for the ceremony
of the coupling
.
He
didn’t care for it himself
,
but he knew how important it was to his employer
. This was all that
mattered, for he had given him life
,
when death had wanted to take it from him
;
given him direction through training and dignity
,
by employing him as his minder, his companion. 

The first item Adam placed on the trolley top was a stainless steel chest retractor
,
used to spread the walls of the chest when cut open for
open-heart
surgery.  It operated on a crank system
,
where each crank spread the two arms of the retractor wider
,
forcing the thoracic muscles to open
, allowing
access to the internal organs.  This one had
proven
its value ten times over.

The next item
,
also stainless steel
, was
a
round forty centimet
r
es long
,
looking
for all
intents
and purposes like garden pruners
,
except
these were surgical shears used for cutting through bone.  The viscous looking parrot beak jaws had never seen a branch
,
but they had crunched through many ribs over the last six years.

The final item was a small black box containing surgical sutures with number 5 steel needles.  It was important to Cupid that his couples looked their best for his filming
,
so stitching them neatly
after his work
was important to him.

Tom decided to try a different
tactic
.  ‘
You’
d better let us go
,
you creep
.
People
will be looking for us
.
’

The whistling stopped
suddenly
.

Tom knew
that
he had made a mistake.

Three quick steps
took
Adam to the wide table on which Tom and Karen were strapped.  Even though he was standing less than a foot
away,
they still couldn’t see him
,
but they could hear his breathing,
forced
and
angry
.

Karen let out a scream that chased away to the high roof as Adam
suddenly
leaned over her, his face inches from hers, his breath warm on her skin.  His eyes narrowed as he looked up and down her body.  To her
,
he was upside down
.
The
deep scars on the left side of his face and
his
drooping eye
gave
him a grotesque gargoyle expression.

Tom sensed the man behind them and
he
knew he was standing close to Karen, who was laying helpless and naked to his left.  Her scream caused his heart to leap as adrenaline shot into his system.  ‘
Keep away from her
,
’ he screamed
,
thrashing wildly against the straps holding him down, ‘
I´ll kill you
,
so help me
.
’

Adam watched him from the corner of his eye thrashing around like a wild animal, screaming threats as the woman continued to cry and whimper
while
he psychologically caressed her.  Her screaming collapsed into a strangled whimper
,
as his tongue slipped out between thick lips
,
flicking as he leaned over
,
as if he were about to run it over her neck and down over her breasts.  In
fact,
he did neither
.
No
contact was made, at least not physical
,
but the mental torment inflicted on Tom was his reward.  Tired of the game
,
he stepped back whistling
,
and completed laying out the surgical instruments.

Karen was reduced to sobbing
,
while
Tom’s efforts had drained him
,
leaving him panting desperately
,
trying to glimpse Karen to his left
.
However, he was
unable to get any movement out of the straps across his neck and forehead.  Two minutes later
,
the screeching door heralded the man’s exit
.
The
light was switched off
,
and the pair
was
plunged once more into the inky black world of despair and fear.  Tom had inched through
the foothills of Afghanistan
and
carried out covert operations in the deadly streets of Iraq
,
but
never in his entire life had he experienced fear as he felt now
.
Nevertheless,
he could not let that fear bleed through to Karen
.
He
had to bolster her,
and he
had to give her hope.

‘
Karen
,
’ he whispered.

Only a child-like whimpering answered him.

‘Karen
,
listen to me, we are going to get out of this, believe me
.
’

‘T
…
T
…
Tom
, we’re going to die. H
e was horrible, he… he’s insane.’

‘Karen
,
we are not going to die
.
Listen
to me
,
we… are… not… going… to die.
’
 
He pronounced each word succinctly
,
needing to snap her out of the hysteria
that
he could hear she was slipping into. 
‘Somebody will
com
e,
sweetheart, trust me
,
’
he implored.

‘
No one
’
s coming
,
Tom
.
No
one
’s going to
find us
,
’
she whimpered.

‘You’re wrong my darling, so wrong. Someone is coming and they’re coming right now.  You have to believe me.’

‘But… how do you know
,
Tom
.
How
could you possibly know?’

Tom squeezed her hand
, ‘
As
sure as night follows day
,
Karen
,
John is coming for us.’

‘Will he find us
,
Tom
,
before… before…?’ 
Karen
’
s voice broke and trailed away.

‘
Karen, he
will find us
.
You
must hold on, he will find us.’ 
Tom couldn’t stop his mind chasing down frightening passageways where he didn’t want to go.  He knew John would be looking for them
.
He
knew that
his friend
would move heaven and earth and then some
,
but as much as
he
had faith in
him
,
he wasn’t sure there was time.  He knew in his heart that
Cupid had taken them
.
He
knew
as
most of the nation knew from the news coverage
,
that this maniac had murdered his victims on the 14
th
February each year for the
past
six years.  His body clock told him that this was the 13
th
.  Whether it was day or
night,
he could not be sure
.
However,
what he was sure of was that if John didn’t find them
,
then tomorrow night
,
they were going to die.  He gave up a silent prayer
,
a prayer to his friend. ‘
Come and get us
,
John, holy
M
other
of God
,
John
,
come and get us
.’

Chapter Seven

13
February
-
10
:
20

(
L
ife
r
emaining 32 hrs 40 mins)

‘Don’t judge what you don’t know about.’

The number Hanson had rung was never written down,
and
never logged into a mobile.  It would take him through to a command centre known only to a chosen few, buried deep in an underground bunker in Hereford
.
Its
existence
was
on a strictly need to know basis. 
As a courtesy to
Turner
, he
switched on the loudspeaker
.
He
wanted him to be fully in the loop with anything relating to the task in front of them. 
Four rings brought a voice that never failed to trigger many memories.

‘
This is Blue Eagle,
i
dentify yourself and give your password
.’