He felt oddly tentative as if he didn’t know what game he was playing. So his first strike was a bit soft.
‘Harder.’
He obliged, but it wasn’t enough.
‘HARDER.’
So he let her have it. And this time he drew blood. Her body flinched with the pain, then seemed to relax as a trickle of blood ran down her back.
‘Again.’
Where was this going to end? He couldn’t tell. The only thing he knew for certain was that this woman wanted to bleed.
25
‘Tell me again what happened’.
Amy shut her eyes and hung her head. Charlie seemed like a nice person and had handled her with kid gloves, but why did she have to do this? Since she’d been released from police custody, she had tried anything and everything to stop thinking about it. Her mother had followed her around like a bloodhound to begin with, but had backed off after Amy had flipped out. Momentarily free of her shadow, she’d hunted out left-over party booze and her mum’s ‘secret’ stash of Valium, and when they didn’t work resorted to her dad’s sleeping pills. Big mistake. In her dreams – nightmares – Sam was ever present. Smiling at her. Laughing. It was unbearable and she’d woken up screaming – to find herself by the front door rattling the chain, desperately trying to escape. She’d decided there and then to stay awake for the rest of her life – never giving in to sleep – and to avoid all human contact. But here were the police again, reminding her of her horrific betrayal.
‘You were hitching. It was raining. A van pulled up.’
Amy nodded mutely.
‘Describe the van to me.’
‘I’ve already made a statement, I -’
‘Please.’
A heavy, breathless sigh. A feeling of suffocation. And suddenly tears were springing up again – Amy forced them down.
‘It was a Transit van.’
‘What make?’
‘Ford? Vauxhall? Something like that. It was white.’
‘What did she say to you? Exact words, please.’
Amy paused, unwillingly climbing back inside the memory.
‘“You need rescuing?” – that’s what she said. “You need rescuing?” Then she opened the passenger door, there was space enough for three in the cab, so we got in. I wish to fuck we hadn’t.’
And this time she did cry. Charlie let her for a second, before handing her a tissue.
‘Did she have an accent?’
‘Southern.’
‘Any more specific than that?’
Amy shook her head.
‘Then what did she say?’
Amy went through it again, beat by beat. The woman had said she was a heating engineer on her way home from an emergency call-out. Amy didn’t remember seeing a logo or name on the van, perhaps there had been, she wasn’t looking. She’d talked about her husband – who was useless at all things practical – and her kids – two of them. She asked them where they were going on a cold winter’s night then offered them a drink.
‘What words did she use?’
‘She noticed I was shivering a bit and said, “You could do with warming up.” That was it. Then she offered us her flask.’
‘Was the drink hot? What did it smell of?’
‘It smelt like what it was. Coffee.’
‘And the taste?’
‘Fine.’
‘What did she look like?’
When would this end?
‘She had short blonde hair. She wore mirror sunglasses on her head. Overalls. Stud earrings, I think. Short, grimy nails. I could see them on the wheel. Dirty hands. Only saw her face from the side. Strong nose, fullish lips. No make-up. Height, average. She looked normal. Completely fucking normal, ok?’
And with that Amy walked out of the sitting room and straight upstairs, choking with tears, struggling to breathe. Assailed by the most awful guilt, she allowed herself a flash of anger. Sam had got it easy. He was dead. His suffering was over. But hers would endure. She would never be allowed to forget what she’d done. Looking down to the paving stones below from her attic bedroom window, Amy wondered if Sam would welcome her if she decided to join him. Suddenly she was seized by the idea and tugged at the handle, but the window lock was on and the key had vanished. Even her family were torturing her now.
26
‘What did she look like?’
Peter Brightston shivered. Ever since they’d picked him up, he’d been shivering. His whole body was quaking, beating out the rhythm of his trauma in some weird, primal way. Helen was certain he was going to keel over at any moment. But the hospital doctors had given them the all-clear to talk to him, so…
He wouldn’t look at her. Just stared down at his hands, pulling at the IV tubes that emanated from him like tentacles.
‘What did she look like, Peter?’
A long beat and then through gritted teeth:
‘She looked bloody gorgeous.’
Helen hadn’t been expecting that.
‘Describe her.’
A deep breath, then:
‘Tall, muscular… black hair… raven black hair. Long. Down to below her shoulders. Tight white T-shirt. Good tits.’
‘Face?’
‘Made up. Full lips. Couldn’t see the eyes. Tinted glasses – Prada ones.’
‘You sure, Prada?’
‘I liked them. Made a mental note. Thought I might get Sarah a pair for our anniversa-’
Then he started to sob.
They got a bit more out of him eventually. The woman had been driving a Red Vauxhall Movano that belonged to her husband. She lived with her chap and three kids in Thornhill. They were in the midst of moving to Bournemouth and were saving cash by doing the removals themselves, hence the van. She was talkative, breezy and mischievous, which is why she’d offered up her husband’s hip flask, badly hidden as ever under the road atlas in the glove compartment. Peter had of course accepted and then slung it Ben’s way. At which point in his testimony, Peter froze once more.
Helen left Charlie to babysit him. Charlie was good with men. She was more conventionally pretty than Helen and had an easy, unthreatening manner – no wonder men flocked to her. In her meaner moments, Helen felt her bland, but she certainly had her uses and would be a good copper in time. But Mark was her sounding board and that was who she needed now.
The White Bear was tucked away in a side street behind the hospital. Helen had deliberately – provocatively – chosen the venue as a test and so far Mark was doing ok, nursing a slimline tonic. It was strange meeting in a pub, made it almost like a date and both felt it. But there were bigger things to occupy them.
‘So what are we dealing with?’ Mark opened the conversation.
He could tell Helen’s mind was spinning, trying to comprehend the latest unexpected developments.
‘Ben Holland is not Ben Holland. His real name is James Hawker.’
Whenever Helen thought of James, she always conjured up the same image – a blood-splattered young man looking utterly lost. Catatonic with shock.
‘His father was a businessman. He was also a fantasist and a fraudster. Joel Hawker lost everything in a bad deal and decided to call time on himself and his family, rather than face the music… He killed the horses first, then the family dog, before setting fire to the stables. Neighbours called 999, but I got there first.’
Helen’s voice wavered a little as she remembered the scene. Mark watched her intently.
‘I was a beat copper back then. I saw the smoke and heard screaming from inside the house so I barged my way in. The wife was dead, the eldest daughter and her boyfriend too, and he was setting about James with a carving knife when I arrived.’
Helen paused before continuing:
‘I took him down. Beat him longer and harder than I needed to. I got a commendation for it, but also a warning as to my future conduct.’
Helen managed a rueful smile, which Mark reciprocated.
‘But I didn’t care. I wished I’d beaten him harder.’