At the end of the street Carter was examining a van that had the college logo on the side. There was a deep scratch along the side. The bumper was dented on the driver’s side, soft impact, thought Carter. He knelt down and ran his hand around the inside of the wheel arch and looked at the residue on his fingers. Dried blood. He rang in.
‘Robbo, I’ve found a van which looks like it could have been the one used in the attacks on Jeanie and Jackson, and Niall Manson.’ He gave him the registration number. ‘Find me the address.’
‘Okay.’
‘Any sign of her, Robbo?’
‘I thought I had a signal but then it went.’
‘Jesus! Okay, I’ll keep going. Let me know if you find anything.’
Carter continued up the street. He knocked at a house five doors up from Yan’s.
‘Did you ever hear of anyone with a pet snake living in this area?’ The tenant shook her head.
‘Has it escaped?’
‘No, nothing like that. Do you know of a man name Yan Stevenson?’
She shook her head. ‘Sorry.’
Ebony got back down to the kitchen level. The music had stopped. She knew he was waiting for her but she didn’t know where. Gripping the pole with both hands, she edged along the corridor. She knew it would take all her strength to knock him hard with it. She wouldn’t get a second chance. She had to hit him and make it good.
‘Ebony?’ She gasped. Out from the shadows he appeared, his face smiling in the gloom. The scarf was in his hand. He came towards her, twisting it between his hands. Ebony swung at him but missed him in the dark. She turned and fled back through the kitchen, tried the back door and couldn’t smash it, and then she ran back down the cellar stairs, along the hallway and into the room with the coffin. He came slowly down the cellar stairs after her.
Ebony unscrewed the light bulb from its pendant fitting and hid behind the coffin in the dark with the snake hook in her hand. She had to focus – to keep calm. She heard him calling from outside the door. She heard the door opening slowly and a small shaft of icy air came into the sweltering hot room. He had a torch in his hand. He shone it around. Ebony started crawling around the room. From the corner of her eye she could see Miranda near her. The snake was coming her way. She dashed to the other side of the room and the torchlight flashed across her.
Leaping forward, she knocked the torch out of his hands with the snake hook. It rolled and clattered on the floor and pointed a beam of light towards the far wall and then went out. He made a grab for her and just caught Ebony’s arm as she lunged forward. He held on tight. She smashed his forearm with her fist. He let go and made another grab as she threw herself forward. He held on to her ankle.
Ebony dragged his weight forwards as well as her own as he smashed his foot down into the back of her knee. She turned and kicked him with a sweep of her foot and caught him off balance as he hit the ground and she scrabbled forwards in the dark. Ebony whipped her upper body round and smacked him hard with the snake hook. She heard it contact with something hard. She heard him groan and he seemed to slip back. Ebony lashed out at him again in the same place and the pole hit and slid over the top of his head. She heard him fall backwards into the pit. But not before he had grabbed hold of her leg and pulled her with him. Miranda paused to listen, she smelt the air with her tongue and turned towards the pit.
Danielle lifted her head to listen to the noise from the cellar. The pendant shifted slightly where it rested on her collarbone.
Robbo leaned towards the screen, hardly daring to breath or blink in case it disappeared.
‘Signal, Jeanie. We have a signal. Get Carter. It’s finding an address. Go, go!’
Carter got the call and whistled to his officers on the street. He sprinted up the steps to the house and began breaking the front door down. Wood splintered as they kicked through the panels.
Inside the hallway he took out his revolver and held it ready as he came to the room on his right and nudged the door open with his foot. Danielle was suspended from the ceiling, her face made up, her body clothed in a bikini.
‘We’re police officers. Where is Yan? Where’s Ebony?’
She could hardly speak. She nodded towards the hallway.
‘There’s a kitchen. A cellar.’
Carter signalled to an officer to phone for an ambulance at the same time as he said he was going down alone. Carter understood that Yan would not give himself up. He would take Ebony with him if she was down there. Carter on his own might work – Carter and an army of police officers never would.
He pushed open the cellar door and stepped down one stair at a time. When he reached the bottom he stood listening and heard nothing. He pushed open the door on the right; the light was on and he saw the corpse covered in webs hanging from the centre of the room. It was against all his instincts that he stepped into the room to make sure she was the only one in there. He had a hard job talking himself through it. He knew if he hadn’t been looking for Ebony he would not have gone in there – nothing else mattered to him now. He had to find her. He came out of the room and walked on down the corridor. He checked three other rooms, which were empty, and then he stopped at the last room on his left and turned the handle. He smelt the musty smell of people and animals and fear. He put his gun away. In the darkness he couldn’t be sure of shooting the right person. He stood in the doorway.
‘Ebb?’
He heard a moaning coming from the middle of the room on the left-hand side. He opened up the torch on his phone and shone its bright narrow beam towards the sound and saw nothing. He walked further inside towards where the noise had come from. He was almost in the hole before he saw it. He shone his torch downwards and saw Ebony staring up at him, her body covered by Miranda’s coils.
He stared, speechless.
‘Guv?’ Her voice came out breathless – squashed. ‘Guv… get this off me.’ Carter reached inside the pit and took her hand as he hauled her out. He took out his radio. ‘Tell everyone we found her. She looks okay – yes I can confirm.’ He looked at what she was wearing. ‘She’s okay. Get me a snake handler and another ambulance. The suspect is not looking so good.’ Carter shone his torch back into the hole and saw the snake coiled around Yan.
Carter looked back at Ebony. He took off his coat to put round her. She was shivering.
‘Like the outfit. Thought you were in trouble – didn’t realize you were having a holiday.’
‘Yeah, funny. Is Danielle okay?’
He nodded. ‘What about you, Ebb?’
She felt too overwhelmed to speak. It wasn’t like her to cry but she was in danger of doing so. Carter hugged her as officers passed them and spread out through the house.
Chapter 53
‘Away in a manger, no crib for a bed.’
The whole of the cast stood as the audience applauded at the end of the show.
Tracy was sitting in the front row next to Danielle. Jackson beamed at them. He was dressed in his bunny suit and stood fidgeting at the entrance to the stable.
Tracy looked across at Danielle and smiled. She reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze.
They walked outside into the bright cold night and Tracy picked Jackson up in her arms.
‘What are you going to do?’ Danielle asked.
‘I’ve applied to be a beauty therapist on a cruise liner and been accepted. I’ll send tickets back for you and Jackson to join me whenever you can along the way.’
‘What about Steve?’
‘We have come to the decision that we won’t divorce for now but we’ll go our separate ways and see how we find it. I’d like to think we could start again but we need time and space for now.’
‘I’m sorry, Tracy.’
‘No, don’t be. It’s a relief for us both. Steve will be able to find out what he wants in life. Instead of always trying to be what I wanted him to be. And maybe we’ll fall in love again – who knows?’
‘What about Christmas?’
‘Steve’s going back to his family for Christmas and I’m hoping for an invite from the two people I really love more than anyone else in the world.’ She gave Jackson a kiss. Danielle smiled. Tracy reached over and kissed Danielle’s cheek. Danielle’s face still bore the scars from the suffering she’d endured. ‘I feel like being a mummy and a nanny to two people I think the world of, if that’s okay?’
‘No problem.’
Jackson shrieked as he struggled to get out of Tracy’s arms.
‘Anyone want a dog?’ Jeanie pretended she hadn’t seen them.
Scruffy was still bandaged around his trunk but able to move his legs. He was ready to go home.