Throwaways (11 page)

Once Kim had gone Tommy and I stared at one another. “Brother, you told me he was an only child, Nancy.”

“He was.” I couldn’t hide the irritation from my voice. I’d been thorough. Well, as thorough as you can be when you don’t have access to the same records the police can get at the touch of a button. I dug my nails into my scalp. “There’s got to be something we missed. Maybe his parents adopted a child. That’d explain why I couldn’t find a record for him.”

That’d make sense,” said Tommy. “So, how do we find that out?”

“Can’t your police contact help?”

Tommy’s forehead creased. “Think they’ve had enough of helping me and are getting worried their boss will find out.”

Great. Now, we didn’t even have outside help.

Tommy grinned at me. “Maybe you could use your feminine wiles to get some info.”

I cackled. “Maybe you could offer to sleep with your police contact? Lots of stuff comes out during pillow talk.”

Tommy held his hands up in mock surrender. “Fair enough, how can we find out if Cassidy’s parents adopted a kid without either of us using our sexual magnetism?”

“Let me think.” And that’s what I did.

Fifteen minutes and 2 hot chocolates and a slice of pizza later, I had a plan.

Five minutes later, we were back in his car putting my plan into action.

After punching the numbers into my phone, I heard it ring and I waited.

“Hello,” a woman’s voice came on. When I asked to speak to Dr. Cassidy’s wife, the woman was reluctant to put her on, but when I gave her my spiel about owning the building Dr.
Cassidy’s office was in and wanting to send a card of condolence, she relented. “Eileen’s sleeping, but I can give you the address. I’m her sister.”

She reeled it off and I pretended to write it down. Then I casually mentioned that Dr. Cassidy had talked about his brother during one of our regular chats.

“You don’t happen to have an address for him so I can send him a condolence card?”

There was a sharp intake of breath. “Sorry, I can’t help you there. Donald’s brother Eddie’s in an institution. He’s been there for oh, it must be 20 years now. That’s why Donald became a psychologist. To help people like his foster brother.”

“What was wrong with Eddie?” I knew I shouldn’t ask, but I couldn’t resist it.

“Eddie started to hear voices, when he was a teenager, a few years after he was adopted by Donald’s parents and he’d get violent.”

“Oh, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Do you know where Eddie is now? Maybe I could send him a card of condolence too?”

A pause. I was expecting her to hang up on me, but after a few seconds she said, “The last time I heard he was in Shield House Hospital.”

Shield House was a psychiatric hospital outside Glasgow. Well, it had been. Years ago it’d been closed down. I wasn’t sure why, but it was probably to save money. These days, they preferred care in the community to institutionalizing people.

Tommy had already typed the name into a search engine on his laptop by the time I’d disconnected the call. “The place was closed down five years ago. It says here the patients were sent to different hospitals.”

He pointed at the screen. “But, one patient didn’t make it to another hospital.”

“Don’t tell me Eddie escaped?”

Tommy nodded. “The papers have the missing patient listed
as Edward Doran, but it’s got to be him. He must have kept his birth name. Maybe he wasn’t formally adopted.”

“Makes sense,” I said. “It’s too much of a coincidence otherwise.”

There was a wee flutter in my chest. “And, what better place to hide abducted women than a disused hospital?”

There was a glint in Tommy’s eyes. “You do know he could be anywhere by now? Even if they did have the women there, he could have scarpered when his brother died; ditched the girls.” He saw my disappointed face. “But, we’ve got nothing to lose by checking it out.”

We arranged for Eric to meet us there.

My dad used to say that no matter what people did nature always managed to fight back. Shield House was proof of that. The hospital had been abandoned five years ago, but it looked more like 15.

The local health authority had been in negotiations to sell the land the hospital stood on to a housing developer, but no work had been done. There wasn’t even a demolition sign. Thistles as high as us had taken over the car park, their purple flowers standing proudly to attention in the grassy wilderness as Tommy snaked the car round them and the weeds.

The hospital itself was set well back from the road and was on six floors. Most of the roof had caved in and pigeons had taken over the building. The outer walls were caked in excrement. All of the windows within view were smashed.

If you were looking for the ideal place to hide abducted women, this was it. Nobody would expect anyone to be within a million miles of this place.

By this time, Eric had joined us in his car. “Let’s check round the back,” he said, with his usual economy of words. There’d been no hello, or small talk.

“Okay,” said Tommy, turning his gaze on me. “You stay in the car and act as a lookout. If anyone comes, toot the horn and drive the hell out of here. We’ll use Eric’s car.”

My whole body shook with indignation. “Are you fucking kidding me?” After all we’d been through he honestly wanted me to play the little woman whilst the men got on with the real work. Screw that.

“I’m coming,” I said. “Are you gonna stop me.” It was a statement of fact, not a question.

For the first time I noticed the worry lines on Tommy’s forehead. “We don’t know what we’re facing, Nancy. Doran
might have a gun.”

Narrowing my eyes, I felt like saying he could have two guns and a machete and he’d still be no match for a pissed off psycho bitch like me. Then I remembered what Eric had said about Tommy not wanting to lose anyone else so I decided to hit him with logic. “Look, if Sheena and the others are inside they’ve been locked up in this dump with Dr. Frankenstein and his psycho brother, doing god knows what to them. They’re going to be traumatized and the last thing they need to see is more men. They might freak out. Think you’re part of it. End up having a heart attack or a mental breakdown.”

“She’s got you there,” said Eric. “And she can handle herself. She’s shown that in training.” He winked at me. “She knows how to fight dirty. In fact, she seems to prefer it.”

A compliment from Eric, at last. Throughout our training, the best I’d got out of him was “not bad” and a wee smile that vanished as quickly as it appeared after I’d broke his nose. Both were so fleeting that afterwards I doubted they’d ever happened at all.

Tommy’s body relaxed. “Okay, but we stick together. We don’t split up at any point.” He motioned to Eric. “You take the front and I’ll bring up the rear.”

“Okay,” I said, wondering if he’d get me to wear those reins that anxious parents put on their kids to stop them from straying off.

“And bring your taser.”

Taser? What did he think I was gonna do – bring my lipstick?

Biting back a catty remark, I followed the pair round the back of the hospital, noticing for the first time that they both had guns.

Tommy caught me looking. “We have special dispensation from the Home Secretary to carry guns because we’re Special Forces.”

I would have said “Oh,” but I was too busy noticing that someone had been here recently. The grass that covered the
loading bay had been trampled down and tyre marks were clearly visible. Judging by the space between them they’d come from a van.

As we got closer, we could see that the rusty padlock on the service door that led to the basement had been cut. My heart started to beat faster. Were we finally going to find Sheena and the others? Please, god, if they were here, let them be alive.

Quietly, Eric pushed the door open and headed inside, gun drawn. I followed.

We’d brought torches, but we didn’t need them. The place was well lit. They must have been using the old hospital generator because surely the electricity would have been cut off a long time ago.

Inside the building, the stench had hit me as soon as I walked through the door, instinctively making me take a step back. I remember reading somewhere that in America they have these shutdown jails – everything is shut off including electricity and water in these abandoned jails. With all the bad air trapped inside they stink when they’re opened up again. The hospital reeked of that level of abandonment. Not even the smashed windows seemed to have aired out the place.

A dirty brown rat the size of a cat scuttled across me and bolted for the door and I felt like joining the creature. If smells could kill this one would knock you dead.

We followed Eric down the stairs, taking great care not to let the metal door swing behind us in case it banged or squeaked.

Now we were inside the hospital basement we faced a dilemma. There were three marked doors. The letters had faded, but we could make out the signs on two of them – laundry and treatment room.

The decision was made for us when we heard a woman’s scream coming from behind the unmarked door. Eric indicated that he’d go in first and I followed him.

“I’m phoning the police,” was the last thing Tommy said
before I followed Eric through that door.

And that’s when someone hit me…

When I came to, my clothes were plastered to my body with sweat and my head felt like someone had been using it to play a game of dodgeball.

Slowly, my eyes came into focus. I was in a large room with peeling white paint and the stench of human faeces. Sheena Andrews was standing over me, her eyes glazed. She was wearing a filthy dress that might once have been pink, over her tiny frame. Straggly hair hung down her shoulders covering some of her face. She reminded me of Sadako, the creepy dead girl who crawled out of the telly in
Ring
.

“Sheena, are you okay?”

My words came out scratchy. It was so hot inside, my throat felt like it’d been sandpapered down. Near me, someone groaned.

Eric was on the floor; his head slumped to one side. There was a knife protruding from his gut.

What the hell happened?

There was fresh blood on Sheena’s dress.

“Sheena, what have you done?”

Why would she stab Eric? It didn’t make sense.

I had to help him.

Trying to get up proved to be a mistake, as the room swirled like water draining down a plughole. Instead, I forced myself to crawl over to Eric. There had to be something I could do.

I’d almost reached Eric when I was yanked back. At first I thought someone had grabbed me, but then I felt the weight on my ankle.

What the hell!

I looked round to see that there was a shackle on my ankle that was attached to a long chain that was bolted to the wall. I was going nowhere. Getting through to Sheena was my only chance.

My gut clenched as I pictured Tommy with a knife stuck in him too, his lifeblood seeping out onto the floor.
Where the hell was he?
He should have burst into the room and be cleaning house by now.

“Sheena.” I said her name softly. “I spoke to your mum and dad. They miss you.”

Not so much as a flicker.

“They want you to come home. They said Chester misses you.”

There was an almost imperceptible movement of her eyes when I mentioned her horse.

“Wouldn’t you love to see Chester again?”

She was still off in la la land as she played with the dirty bandage that covered the stump of her missing finger. In these filthy conditions it was a wonder it hadn’t got infected and killed her.

Time for a change of tact.

“I met Donna,” I said brightly. “She thinks you’re dead and she’s responsible. She wishes she’d gone with you.”

“Donna.” She said her friend’s name so faintly at first I thought I’d imagined it, but then she met my gaze; eyes slowly coming alive and filled with confusion. “Is she okay?”

She took a step towards me. That’s when I spotted Eric’s gun on the window ledge. It was too far away for me to reach. I needed to get free.

“She’s fine,” I said. “Still saying you know at the end of every sentence. Still gobby.”

Sheena’s face relaxed, her lips curling into something approaching a smile.

“Can you unlock this?” My gaze focused on the chain around my ankle. “My friend Eric needs urgent medical help or he might die.”

She placed a finger on her lips. “Sssshhh, he’s coming.”

Despite the summer heat, I shivered.

There were footsteps and my heartbeat quickened. There was nothing I could use as a weapon within reach. The only thing within range was a filthy mattress that should have been incinerated years ago. My taser was gone.

“Sheena,” I said quietly, “you need to help me get free.” I tried to keep a lid on my rising panic.

Sheena didn’t reply. She simply stood there, waiting; an obedient little servant. Panic beat against my chest like a steel drum. I was going to die here or worse, the doctor’s mad brother was going to keep me here all chained up then dissect me bit by bit because the voices told him to.

A thought crept into my head; a plan so crazy, it might just work. Lying flat down on the floor, I pretended to still be unconscious. There was a creak as the doors swung open, followed by footsteps.

“Good girl,” I heard a man say in a soft Irish lilt. His voice had a hypnotic quality to it. He sounded like a therapist, not a schizophrenic.

His tone didn’t change when he addressed Eric. “Tell me where your other friend is, or I’ll twist the knife in deeper and don’t lie to me about him being here; I saw him on the cameras.”

Shit
, why hadn’t we spotted them?

“What’s that?”

He must have leaned over Eric’s prone body to hear and been told to go fuck himself, because the next thing Eric screamed; a feral scream that could have come from a wild animal. The bastard must have twisted the knife.

Unless I did something he was going to kill him.

“Please, help me,” I said. I made my words sound as pathetic as I could. “I can’t move. I think I’m paralysed.” My eyes were open wide and staring up at the ceiling. I had to make him think there was something wrong with me so he’d leave Eric alone and come over.

He said something like “I’ll deal with you later,” to Eric and
strode over to me. That’s when I realised that we’d all been duped. Donald Cassidy wasn’t dead. Unless the doctor had a double, he was very much alive. How was that even possible?

DI Waddell had a lot of explaining to do. How the hell had the boys in blue missed Cassidy’s switcheroo?

“I can’t move,” I mumbled, so he’d have to crouch down to hear me. He knelt down. That’s when I sprang into action.

Seizing the Stanley knife I’d secreted in my sock, I flicked it open and jumped to my feet.

“Don’t be silly, girly. I know you’re not going to use it.”

His use of girly really pissed me off.

“Is that right?” I hissed.

Without any hesitation, I lashed out with the blade and raked it across his ankle, slicing it open like it was a banana. He shrieked and staggered backwards, yelling and that’s when I stuck a leg out. He tripped and fell, agonisingly too far away for me to rummage through his pockets for the keys to the chain. The knife flew out of my hand and landed too far away for me to reach it. Casting a glance towards Sheena, I knew she’d be no help – she was still a robot. Any chance I’d had of escape was gone.

When I heard footsteps, my heart did a wee skip. It had to be Tommy.

The door swung open to reveal the last person I expected to see. Lorna Chanderpaul.

In that instant, I realised that she’d done more than supply Cassidy with girls.

He was coming for her. Not the nicer one who’d stroked Diane’s hair and told her she was pretty before the mean one who called himself doctor had marched in and scudded him across the face with an open palm, calling him a dumb boy and ordering him out the room
.

She hadn’t seen the nicer one for days now or was it weeks? In here
,
time had lost all meaning
.

Would Kyra even remember her? Or, was her mum her mum now? She knew she should be happy that her wee girl had someone, but instead she felt sad. Kyra was the only good thing that’d ever happened to her
.

Sometimes she’d wake up and feel Kyra stroking her hair the way she always did on the nights when she’d have a bad dream, when she’d come running into her bed bawling because she was convinced something terrible was hiding in her wardrobe. When she realised Kyra wasn’t there, it physically hurt
…

The footsteps outside the room got closer and Diane’s heart was beating so fast she thought it was about to burst. It made it worse that he always fumbled about with different keys as if he couldn’t remember which key to use. He liked to mess with her mind. He liked to do that as well as sticking needles in her. At one point, he’d even thrust one long one deep inside her as she’d thrashed against the restraints and screamed until her throat was raw underneath the gag. Finally she’d passed out with the pain
.

When she’d asked him why he was doing this, he’d said she was wicked and needed to be cured. Then he’d grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into another room with a bath. He’d ordered her to strip and climb into the bath with lukewarm water and the kind of scrubbing brush you’d use to scrub the stairs
.

“Use that,” he’d ordered, holding up the brush. “And scrub yourself clean. If you miss a spot I’ll do it for you.”

She didn’t dare defy him
.

She’d scrubbed herself until her skin stung and bled. Afterwards, as her vision swam with tears, he’d hauled her out of the bath and flung her and her clothes back in this room
.

There’d been no food or water for her that night
.

When the door opened, she braced herself for what she knew was about to happen
…