Two Evils: A DI Charlotte Savage Novel (35 page)

Five minutes later and she was in her car heading away from the station and towards the dual carriageway. The streets were quiet, just the occasional set of headlights reflecting on roads slick with drizzle. At Soar Mill Cove, she thought, there’d be nobody at all. Nothing but the sea and the cliffs and the wind and the rain.

She arrived at the coast some thirty-five minutes later, the shape of Woodland Heights looming black against the night sky. She ignored the track to the home and instead followed the road round to the National Trust car park where a solitary vehicle stood near the entrance. Inside the car the interior light illuminated the bulky figure of DSupt Hardin. As she pulled up alongside, he opened his door and got out.

‘Sir?’ Savage said as she got out of her own car. ‘Where the hell’s the backup?’

‘Not coming, Charlotte.’ In the darkness, Savage couldn’t make out the expression on Hardin’s face, but she heard him exhale a sigh. ‘This is personal. I wasn’t stupid enough to come here on my own, but I needed someone I can rely on, not a load of grunts. We’re different, Charlotte, you and I. I usually do things by the book. Bullet points. A click of the mouse. One, two, three. You’re a maverick, you act on impulse, make it up as you go along. I guess the clue’s in your name. Savage. The name comes from the French, doesn’t it? Doesn’t mean aggressive or nasty at all. It means wild. That’s your nature.’

‘Sir?’ Savage was lost. She’d never heard Hardin talk like this before. ‘What did the message say?’

‘Here.’ Hardin reached into his jacket and pulled out a scrap of paper. He passed the paper across to Savage.

Savage leant into the car so she could use the interior light to see. The handwriting had the same distinctive curls as the first letter, but there was just one line.

‘This doesn’t make sense,’ Savage said. ‘With the evidence we found at Brenden Parker’s place, it looks like he’s the killer of Liam Clough and the person who’s got Jason Hobb.’

‘So?’

‘But somebody’s Tasered Parker. They’ve abducted him. The same person who took Perry Sleet and killed Tim Benedict has now got Brenden Parker.’

‘But why …?’

‘Something to do with the home. Something those men have done. Sir, I really don’t think we should be going down to the cove without backup. This could be dangerous.’

‘Nonsense. I’m going to do my duty. Just like the letter said.’ Hardin went round to the rear of his car and sprung the hatch. He pulled out a set of walking boots and a couple of torches. He handed one to Savage. ‘Take this and if you’ve got any gear then get it on.’

‘But, sir—’

‘Shut it, DI Savage. That’s an order. If you don’t want to come, then fine. Otherwise let’s get moving.’

Savage shook her head, but took the torch. She went to her car, retrieved her waterproof and in the boot found a pair of wellingtons. Not ideal for walking the coast path, but they’d have to do.

They kitted up and set off. The path was level for the first half a mile and then dropped sharply away down to the cove. They trudged along, little pools of light from the torches the only thing to focus on.

‘So Brenden Parker’s out of the picture now, is he?’ Hardin said as they walked. ‘He kidnapped Liam and Jason and killed Liam Clough. However, the tables have been turned. But if somebody
has
captured Parker and he’s the killer, then how did he hand-deliver a note to me this evening?’

‘That’s why I said it’s a trap, sir.’

‘So who did it? Parker Senior is in custody, as is Ned Stone.’

Savage left the question unanswered and they walked on in silence, taking care on the steep path which zigzagged down the hillside. The going wasn’t easy in daylight, and now, with only torches and in the wet, the path was treacherous. Finally, they reached the bottom, where a slippery concrete ramp led down to the beach. Savage could hear the waves in the distance, a line of white surf punctuating the darkness.

The cove felt very different at night. The beach sloped down to the sea, bisected by a stream which tumbled over little stones and made a constant low gurgle to complement the rhythmic noise from the waves. To either side, the cliffs rose like black curtains. Above, rain floated down from dark clouds, becoming silver speckles as the drops were caught in the torch beams.

‘Here we are,’ Savage said as they stepped onto the beach. ‘What now?’

‘We split up.’ Hardin played his torch on the stream. ‘You’ve got wellies so you take the right side. Save me getting wet, won’t it?’

Savage was going to protest, but Hardin had already set off into the darkness, moving across the beach to the eastern side, the beam from his torch sweeping back and forth as he went. She turned and plodded through the stream, the water surging up the side of her boots.

She reached the far bank of the stream and trudged over an area of wet sand and seaweed. Hardin appeared to think they’d find something down here, but what? Some kind of message, a cryptic clue, a bad joke? Suppose there was nothing to find, suppose he’d got it wrong and she’d got it right? Suppose somebody was going to find them?

She turned her torch off to make her presence less obvious and then criss-crossed the beach, going from the stream to the cliffs and back again and working her way down towards the sea. Her night vision improved with every passing minute and before long she found she’d covered most of her side. Now she reached a rocky outcrop which she needed to climb over.

‘Charlotte!’ Hardin’s voice boomed out across the cove. Light reflecting on the cliffs marked his position at the far edge of the beach. ‘Anything yet?’

Jesus, Savage thought. Talk about keeping a low profile. She shouted back that she was still looking and then began to edge over the rocks. The wellingtons, useful for keeping her feet dry as she’d crossed the stream, were now a liability, the last sort of footwear she wanted when clambering over wet rocks. She moved slowly round the outcrop, using the torch intermittently to guide her way. On the other side, she knew there was a fissure in the cliff face, a crack which turned into a cave. Beyond, the cliffs jutted round to another beach which could only be reached at low tide. She wouldn’t go there, not without Hardin.

As she eased herself off the rocks onto a finger of sand, her heart missed a beat. Something lay in the sand. She switched her torch on. A shoe. Black leather with a flat heel, a woman’s style. She peered along the finger to where the sand ran between two outcrops and into a pool of water which led into the cave. She shone the torch on the water. Tiny fish darted away from the beam and on the bottom of the pool a crab moved sideways across the sand. The water was too deep for her wellingtons and she didn’t fancy clambering across the seaweed-covered rocks. She flicked the torch beam beyond the pool and into the cave. The light penetrated the darkness and what had been a gaping hole leading to the underworld was revealed as not much more than a crack in the rocks leading back just a few metres. There was nothing in there other than a few pieces of flotsam and jetsam: a couple of plastic fishing buoys, some pieces of wood, a tangle of netting.

Savage turned to go back the way she’d come, but as she did so she slipped on a patch of seaweed. She put her hand out to brace herself as she dropped to the sand, at the same time letting go of the torch. The torch fell into the pool, the light extinguished immediately.

Blackness. She closed her eyes for a second, trying to regain her night vision. When she opened them, the black had changed to grey. She pushed herself up, aware of her damp clothes covered in sand. She wondered how she was going to get back around the outcrop without a torch. She could call Hardin, she supposed, but she never liked to ask for help unless absolutely necessary. For one, Hardin would assume he was coming to her aid because she was a woman.

Savage glanced around. The shadows were making her uneasy; her night vision had partially returned, but overhead the clouds had thickened, the rain now heavier. She peered up to see if there might be any chance of a respite. Above the cliffs dark shapes scudded across the sky, the wind sweeping in from the south-west. A gust tore at her hair and she reached up to tuck a strand back under her hood. As she did so, something bumped against her hand. Savage ducked, thinking she had got too close to the cliff face. She turned and looked up to see a naked foot swing past her eyes.

Savage stepped back and tripped over again. Dangling there in mid-air hung the body of a woman, her hands and feet bound together, one foot bare, the other foot wearing a black shoe. There was a noose around the woman’s neck and the rope from the noose disappeared up into the darkness of the night, the body slowly rotating in a grotesque parody of a dance.

Chapter Thirty-One

A lot’s been happening since I rescued Jason from the cellar. The home is going to close down on orders from the Home Office. According to Father, it’s all to do with some government initiative, but Bentley is involved somewhere, I’m sure. The incident with Jason and Liam brought too much attention on the place and shutting the home was the best option. The upheaval has finally brought to light the problems in Father and Mother’s relationship. They’re splitting up and Mother is leaving. Surprisingly she’s taking me with her. She sat me down and told me she had been a bad parent, but that she would make it up to me. Of course, with the home closing, it means we’re moving. And when I say ‘we’, I mean Mother and Smirker and I.

Smirker is my new friend. My only friend. He’s perfect. He always listens and he always wants to play. For the record, I guess I need to explain how Smirker came into being. You see, when I retrieved Jason’s head from the cellar I realised I couldn’t keep him. Not in his present state. Still, I didn’t want to lose him, not again. I stole a large pot from Miss Bickell’s kitchen and that night I took it down to the cove. I gathered driftwood and at the entrance to the cave I built a fire. I filled the pot with seawater and set it to boil. Once the water was bubbling, I delved into my rucksack and brought out Jason’s head. I dropped the head in the pot and boiled it for several hours, at some point falling into a deep sleep. A strange light woke me and I blinked my eyes open to see a dawn sky of deepest crimson. I drained the water from the pot and found the skin had sloughed away from the skull. I pulled out the skin and put it to one side, thinking I might dry the scalp and make some kind of wig from it. Then I lifted the skull from the pot. I found that the brain had softened and it was a simple matter to extract everything using a fork. Next, I took the head down to the shoreline and washed it until there was nothing left but gleaming bone.

As the waves ebbed and flowed over the hunk of bone in my hands, I realised Jason had long gone. Perhaps his soul had been carried out to sea and he was with Liam. Perhaps he was in Heaven. Perhaps he was gazing down at me through the eyes of one of the gulls which swooped in over the breakers. Really, I had no idea. But when I looked at the skull I understood it didn’t matter. Here was a new friend, a friend who’d be true, who’d stick with me through any adversity. Tim Benedict was right all along. Praying DID work and God HAD answered my wish. He’d taken his time, but the wait was worth it.

I took the skull back to the cave where I sat it on a rock. I groped in my coat pocket and found two large marbles. I placed one in each eye socket so the skull could see who’d rescued him. My new friend grinned at me and it was at that very moment I knew his name had to be … SMIRKER!

The wait is over. The Shepherd goes to Sleet’s cell and opens the door. The man is trying to hide in one corner, crouching like a mouse cowers from a cat.

‘Get up,’ the Shepherd says. ‘It is time for you to do penance. To atone.’

Sleet hunkers down, but the Shepherd is in no mood for wasting time so he pulls out the Taser and fires the weapon. The barbs hit Sleet in the thigh and he rolls away from the corner, his body in spasms as thousands of volts of electricity surge through him. He opens his mouth and a guttural roar spews forth.

The Shepherd steps forward and grabs Sleet. He pulls the man to his feet and leads him from the room. In the corridor they pass a large mirror on the wall. Sleet glances at his reflection and creases his face as if he can’t believe what he’s seeing.

In the next-door chamber the glare from the lights shines down on the altar. Sleet flinches as he spots the stainless steel table and the glint from the power tools.

‘Behold the altar,’ the Shepherd says. ‘Where you will atone for your sins.’

‘That guy in the cell next to mine,’ Sleet says. ‘You put him on here? Tortured him?’

‘No.’ The Shepherd leers in close. ‘The Reverend Tim Benedict tortured himself the day he decided to become a coward. From then on his path was predestined. This was always how it was going to end for him.’

‘But I haven’t been a coward.’ Sleet struggles to remain upright. ‘I haven’t
done
anything.’

‘I think that’s the point, Perry,’ the Shepherd says. ‘You didn’t do anything. That’s what cowardice is.’